Respond!?!

I've been wondering what makes people respond to blogs. There are several that I check almost daily, and some gets hundreds of responses and some get almost none. One of my favorites is Charlie Stross. He has a robust and regular posting that is usually thought provoking on purpose and he has a very intellectual group of followers that love to mix it up. I don’t feel smart enough to even post on his site, but I love to lurk. Another of my favorites is new author Mary Robinette Kowal, who is also very regular in her postings, but I don’t think I‘ve ever seen more than a handful of responses to her posts. She isn’t fishing for responses and it doesn’t seem to matter to her. I have no idea how many hits she is getting, but whoever they are rarely engage with her. I think she’s fascinating.

      I love it when people post a response. It feels strangely validating. I see some bloggers respond to every response, that’s nice, but unfortunately I don’t have access to my blog from work and I travel and work long hours some days, and sometimes I can’t access the site for a day or two. I like to give back the love to the people that respond, I really do appreciate that they took the time to come to my blog, read it and reply to it. Know that I really love to see responses and if I were able I would reply to all of them. What I do try to do is reciprocate but following back and retweeting their blogs on Twitter. I like to help promote my friends.

      One of my favorite bloggers is Jami Gold and she did something this week to celebrate her 1st anniversary as a blogger and started a contest. She actually had more people than ever before post a reply on her blog. I think it surprised her, but I know she is happy about it.

      I come full circle back to why I put stuff on here. The idea was to have a destination for people to come to when I actually publish my book. I know I like interacting with my favorite authors and have been fortunate enough to engage with a few of them. One of my all-time favorites is CJ Cherryh, and she’s had an internet presence for a very long time. She started her own website maybe 15 years ago. She now has a very active blog and has even started her own company, Closed Circle, to release her backlist and some new content with her partners, Jane Fancher and Lynn Abbey. They aren’t nearly as well known to the world as JK Rowling, but they beat her to the idea of selling their stuff directly by a year.

      Anyway, I wanted all this laid out in advance because I’m hopeful of some limited success and a follow-on career as a writer, and wanted to have my readers have a place to come and interact with me. With this place already established I could focus on writing more and making new internet friends. I wasn’t sure what to blog about and it’s been all over the map, but that’s ok too. I’m just trying to share stuff that I’m thinking about. I’m happy if it strikes a chord with others.

      Why do you blog? How do you feel about people responding to your posts? The funny thing is I think you have to have a blog to respond to this blog. I wish I could see everyone that reads, even the ones that don’t have a Blogger account. Just curious.

      I’m travelling this weekend to visit my parents. My Dad is having some health issues, and I want to see him before he has surgery. It may be a few days before I have internet access again. I hope you all have a wonderful 4th of July weekend!

Clear Ether!