First Post!

I believe there is an inherent storytelling trait in all of us. Whether it be telling a joke you’ve just heard, where the best Mexican food place in Brisbane is , sharing the amazing trip you’ve just taken and bored everyone on your Facebook page by showing thousands of photos of it or simply telling someone how your day was. I believe sharing is human nature. What blogging accomplishes is that, instead of sharing your story with one, five or ten people, you can now share that story with everyone and anyone on the internet. So blogging I believe is an extension of yourself or at least it should be, as Watson (2013) eluded in his lecture:

Ultimately though the aim is to enhance my digital identity through blogging; I have been hesitant to put any type of digital identity because once you post something online it’s there forever. In the lecture we looked at how social media goes wrong, funnily enough this past weekend there was an article on news.com.au . While this misfortune happens to big corporations or highly visible people fairly often it can occur to anyone. A friend of mine works for a recruiting company, she had a candidate who got an offer for a job for a big children’s company, the offer was reneged after the company saw the candidates Facebook page which depicted her working as a promo girl. This did not really fit into the company image for obvious reasons. This just reiterates what was said in the lecture, companies will more or less troll your digital identity. Yes I am aware that most social media platforms have privacy settings, but really you are going to trust these companies that they will never be hacked and that your information will never get out? So the way that I look at it is, once you post something online just assume that anyone can see it.

This blog will chart my progress through Enterprise 2.0. Now let’s be honest I don’t have a passion for Enterprise 2.0 this is just a means to an end so if I veer off topic don’t hold it against me. I do realise that business are beginning to take a lot of notice on Web 2.0, in particular I have been however fascinated with O’reillys pattern of Web 2.0, harnessing collective intelligence. I find myself relying on collective intelligence for almost everything I do and I totally agree with the news.com.au article Bed bugs, bad service banished thanks to online trip review sites like Yelp, Tripadvisor on news.com.au. In a nutshell it states that these review web sites help people decide where the good restaurants and hotels are, there are some obvious issues basing every decision purely on collective intelligence. I have just been to USA with my girlfriend and stayed at a top 20 hotel on Tripadvisor in Orlando it was the worst hotel of our entire trip, we complained and threated to put bad feedback on every trip website we could. After having the issue escalated to their corporate office next time we are in Orlando we will be staying at their penthouse suite (We don't plan on going back to Orlando any time soon!).

I am a firm believer of "if you build it, they will come". If the blog is informative, entertaining, well written and/or funny but most importantly passionate people will read it and they will come, comment and build that community that we thrive for. Not to say I won’t spruik it on Facebook and Twitter.  But if the blog is rubbish then no one will read it, I’ll attract the trolls, I love a good argument and will feed the trolls and I’ll feature on Cracked's top 10 blog fails list. So it’s all well and good for Jason to say spruik your blog here and there but if the blog is ultimately rubbish you will essentially harm your digital identity rather than enhance it. It has been my experience that most blogs are rubbish.

"Nothing great has ever been accomplished without enthusiasm"

I love this quote and only learned about it this year but it’s brilliant and so apt for a blogging strategy as enthusiasm and passion I believe go hand in hand. The major point that I am taking away from this weeks lecture and other readings is that passion trumps everything, in my opinion those are the successful blogs. You could have the most accurate, neat, theoretically correct blog but if you don’t transcend the lcd screen you are going straight to the rubbish pile my friend.

My favourite "blog" started in the early 00s, The Boston sports guy, he then moved to ESPN to write for them and later he got his own website under the ESPN umbrella where he has other writers "blogging". Bill Simmons is not the greatest writer, his predictions are usually wrong, his analysis is sometimes flawed and technically he would be considered a columnist BUT he is passionate about what he writes and you can’t help but be caught up in it and his style of writing is pretty much like a blog.

What I love about blogs is finding that diamond in the rough, unfortunately there is a lot of rough.

References:

ESPN. (2013, Jun 24). Survive and Advance (Part 1) - 30 for 30 [Video file]. Retrieved from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BJ5WD2m-H8s&feature=youtu.be&t=23m52s
Lott, C. (2012). Social Media Explained (with Donuts) [Image]. Retrieved August 5, 2013, from http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7159/6847365223_4b5bdabf97_n.jpg
Watson, J. (2013). INB 346 Enterprise 2.0 [Lecture Slides]. Retrived from  http://blackboard.qut.edu.au/bbcswebdav/pid-4949814-dt-content-rid-1042751_1/xid-1042751_1
Universal. (2011, May 30). If You Build It, He Will Come - Field of Dreams (1/9) Movie CLIP (1989) HD [Video file]. Retrieved from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Ay5GqJwHF8