Girls race ahead as halfway stage draws near

Just to say that the last week has been easily the best week so far. Most of you are now blogging with some confidence and that’s great to see. There is, moreover, a clear gender divide emerging. With a couple of exceptions (and it is a couple) the girls are racing ahead of the boys. Here’s why:

This week’s star performer is Zlata Rodionova who’s Islington Green is a good example of how a global issue (climate change) can be applied to a local area (Islington) to great effect. Snappy title too – a really effective but simple pun.

I know I’ve singled her out already, but Raj Sandhu is worth noting again. This time for a lively account of how local surveillance is affecting her daily routine. Raj has built a blog with a variety of different types of stories and different lengths. It is short of pictures and the blog title is not quite right but it’s building into a fine body of work.

I also thought that Hoa Pham’s brave work on childhood abuse is both technically accomplished and journalistically significant; Joanna Aniel Bidar‘s “Gaza through the open lens” is belatedly coming into focus and Laura Jane Thompson is motoring away, although I’m not sure if her most recent post re-cycling the names of the winners of the NME awards is on-topic. Why read it there rather than at NME.com?

Mentions too to the visually arresting “Murdered in South London” by Tamara Obeng; a first look at Beatriz Arroyo’s thoughtful elegy for the tropical rainforest; while Ylenia Lemos and her blog on student health care is also worth a look. In terms of writing flair, Kiki Pattison Smith’s look at animal welfare demonstrates a whole heap of potential. Note how many original turns-of-phrase she deploys, in each post. Indeed “more than you can shake a cattle-prod at”.

I would really have liked to have featured more boys in this list but, alas, they are being outflanked by more mentally agile and industrious girls. Come on lads, surely you can step up before Friday …

New blogs of note

There’s been a sudden flurry of activity week. Here’s the pick of the bunch:

Although she can’t quite hide her admiration for Pete Doherty, I think Laura-Jay Thomson’s serious look at the politics of youth and music has made something of a head start. Junior Walker is on similar ground with his blog about music and censorship.

Monika Braun has impressed with here ability to take the initiative with some promising first-hand reporting. Note the excellent use of photos.

Sonila Reka has been most industrious. Covering the topic of teenage suicide with insight and confidence. As has Stephanie Ott with her blog on the diamond trade.

I’ve also enjoyed reading about how the police are using anti-terrorism laws to curtail the freedoms of press photographers. Good work by Marina Watson Peláez.

Mentions too to Carolyn Charlton, Danielle Stacey and Dursaff Ibrahim. Keep up the good work.

Why short is often sweet

There are no rules to how long a post needs to be. Sometimes, just sometimes mind, the shorter they are the sweeter they read.

One of the blogs I visit most is that of Jason Kottke, who blogs often and in and extremely pithy way. He makes his point and moves on – posting several times a day.

Another favourite is Things Magazine which breaks one long post into several subjects. Note how rich in links it is.

Some writers take the “less is more” ethos to the extreme. Paul Ford is famous for writing six-word music reviews; London’s Devon Dungeon reviews whole plays in just five words.

Of course I am not saying that all your posts should be a few words long, just that sometimes they can be.

Extra links for February 23

You can “accessorise” your blog with a number of add-ons or “widgets”. To do so is simple- just go to your dashboard and click-on Appearance > Widgets and then add the ones you want into your “side-bar”.  There are a number of default applications that you can use straight away …  and others that involve you adding a little bit of code that you get from other websites.

Here are two widgets you could try to add:

+ Register at the bloggers’ bible: technorati: This will eventually help you build an audience, even a community, around you work.

+ Add a free (external) web counter at Motigo.

Getting help from WordPress

Here’s a bunch of links that might help you get going with WordPress:

The official WordPress introduction to Blogging

How to change the appearance of your blog (video)

An independent WordPress User’s Guide

Manging your links in WordPress

The Machine is Us/ing Us

An award-winning short film from Kansas State University’s Digital Ethnography Unit. Explains succinctly where new net technologies – including blogging – might be taking us.