Comments on: I’m no longer a blogger

By: Merredith

Merredith — Tue, 12 Feb 2008 23:52:00 +0000

Personally, I liked the Dr. Johnny Fever reference best… but does it really matter? It would be nice to say that the forum is beside the point, but if it was, we wouldn’t be here. Ike — and most of you here — you think, you make connections, you communicate, you write. Sometimes the words glide across the page and screen and seem like they could have been written no other way, they make so much sense. I have a sense of your personality that I wouldn’t otherwise have. So I’m glad — whether it’s a blog or an epistle or whatever you want to call it. I’m too tired to debate much.

I’ll respect anyone’s wishes. If you don’t want to be a blogger any longer, or called one, that’s fine (and I have no accent to ameliorate the title).

By: Jeremy Pepper

Jeremy Pepper — Sun, 10 Feb 2008 21:49:39 +0000

It’s the stupid and those that cannot think beyond their noses and see the bigger picture that label themselves blogger (or even social media specialists).

I had this issue at a PR firm: they siloed me into blogger boy. It was stupid, as it ignored my media relationships and talents.

Blogger or social media is a single bullet point in a bigger job description. That’s all it is.

By: Ike

Ike — Mon, 04 Feb 2008 16:03:17 +0000

Randy, for some reason it sounds a lot more respectable when you say it. Maybe it’s that rich Canadian accent…

By: Randy Steinman

Randy Steinman — Sun, 03 Feb 2008 22:21:17 +0000

Ike,

I am going to apologize to you in advance. I signed off on my book early this week… and have this for your bio (note the FINAL word):

“Isaac Pigott’s 16-year broadcast career included several awards for reporting and an Emmy for news writing. He is the Director of
Communications for the American Red Cross in the southeastern U.S. A graduate of the University of Alabama, he authors Occam’s RazR, a renowned Corporate Communications Blog.”

Had I only seen your post five days earlier, I would have gladly edited it. Sorry about that.

RPS

By: Meghan

Meghan — Fri, 01 Feb 2008 21:04:26 +0000

The other day, my six-year-old son and I were playing the dozens…coming up with funny ways of insulting each other…whereas I would call him a “lampshade terrorist” and he would call me a “double decker tacohead”…just playfully stretching our imaginations before he went to bed. Towards the end of the game, I called him a “potato farmer” and he hurled at me, “You blog!” I laughed a nice, hearty laugh and realized he had totally just won the game.

By: Peter

Peter — Thu, 31 Jan 2008 05:11:03 +0000

You can stop calling yourself a blogger, but others will annoyingly persist in labelling you as such. It’s like the debate between linguists who take a prescriptive approach (telling others how they think the language should be used) vs those who take the descriptive approach (analyzing the language as it exists). To my mind the prescriptives never win – language has a life of its own.

That said, I totally agree with your point about “blogger relations” and “blogger ethics” being icky terms.

By: cooper

cooper — Thu, 31 Jan 2008 02:32:47 +0000

I’m happy to join this train. I’m not a blogger either. At one time I was a freshman in college who called herself Alice and wrote stuff at “Wonderland or Not”. Some time passed, and all of a sudden I was called a blogger.

It a relief to shed that skin, I’m sick of all those blogging rules anyway.

By: GeekMommy

GeekMommy — Wed, 30 Jan 2008 23:59:20 +0000

Oh well… late to the party as usual!
Now I get the Twitter reference.

I don’t refer to myself as a blogger – but because I don’t make a living that way – any more than I refer to myself as an artist, a philosopher, a writer, or any other ‘descriptor’ – because at the moment, that’s not how I earn my bread and butter.

If someone pays me to blog? I’ll accept the term blogger. Not in the limiting sense – but in the ‘she’s currently making money doing X’ sense.

It’s kind of like being labeled a “children’s author” or “sci-fi author” or any other descriptor – shorthand for those who want to know how one makes one’s living.

But I do understand your offense at the term.

I didn’t exactly think of you as a Blogger – so much as a Twitter friend who happens to write really well.

By: bg

bg — Wed, 30 Jan 2008 20:15:30 +0000

Personally, I could take it or leave it. Some words get me crazy where I feel expected to live up to their definition, but I’m okay with blogger if people need a label for things.

I’m more about the expression of the idea itself anyway. Call it being media agnostic. The concept that it’s the idea or message that counts, not the method of delivery, be it blog, letter to the editor, photograph, etc.

By: Mark Rose

Mark Rose — Wed, 30 Jan 2008 20:10:40 +0000

You know the garbageman is now a sanitary technician but his job is still the same.