Blogging Metaphor: Blogging Is a Large City with Hundreds of Small Neighborhoods
June 8, 2007 by Lillie
Liz Strauss at Successful-Blog started a group writing project: What’s Your Blogging Metaphor?
A number of great posts have already been submitted. My favorite is How Do You Explain Blogging to Your Mom? by Char at Essential Keystrokes.
To me, blogging is a large city filled with hundreds of small neighborhoods. When you first start to blog, it’s like moving to a new city.
Perhaps you already have family and friends in your new home; a new blogger who has friends or associates who are blogging starts out like you – already part of a small community.
But maybe you moved because of your job, and you don’t know anyone in the strange city that is now your home. A new blogger who steps into the blogging world without any established relationships starts out like you.
Regardless of how you start out, though, soon you’ll be meeting new people. You meet people at your job; you get acquainted with your neighbor at the grocery store; you make friends at the church you join; you find golfing (or quilting or reading or …) buddies at the country club, quilting club, library reading group, or … As a blogger, you meet bloggers in your niche market by visiting blogs on your topic; you get acquainted with your blog neighbors as you check out other blogs in your community; you make friends and find buddies that share your interests through various social networks.
One day, you may be waiting in line at the post office or attending an office party or returning a book at the library. Your neighbor or your coworker or your reading group buddy introduces you to their friend, who soon becomes your friend. As a blogger, you will be introduced to lots of new blogging friends through the blogs you read.
In your new physical home, you’ll make friends faster if you reach out to join clubs, participate in community activities, and introduce yourself to people who share your interests. In your blog home, you’ll make virtual friends faster if you visit and comment on other blogs-introduce yourself and continue the conversation.
Suddenly, you’ll look around and realize the city that seemed so large and intimidating when you first moved in is really lots of small communities made up of people and businesses with something in common. The city comprises hundreds of these neighborhoods, but you may be part of a dozen or two. In the same way, the new blogger will look around and see that the blogosphere that seemed to large and intimidating is really lots of small communities made up of people and businesses with something in common.
In the physical location where you live, you probably stay within the communities you’ve come to know, enjoy, and find useful. But if you venture out of your familiar neighborhoods, you might find new friends and new experiences … just as you did when you first moved to town.
In the blog world, you’ll find new friends and new experiences if you expand beyond your familiar neighborhoods and carry the conversation into new communities.
[tags]Blogging Metaphor[/tags]
Wow – I can’t get over all the creative metaphors that are emerging from this project. Thanks for sharing yours, too.
Lillie, very good analogy! I like the lesson: get out more! True in life, and now, true in blogging, too!
Char,
There are some great metaphors, but yours is my favorite.
Thanks, Robert. I’m glad you liked the analogy.
i never thought of it this way, but you are absolutely right.
That’s a super analogy! How true. This would be a great post for new bloggers to read — that, in a nutshell, is how to become part of a community of bloggers: reach out to them and develop reciprocal relationships which, over time, turn to friendship.
Thomma Lyn, you are right, but I’d push it more: this is a great post for all bloggers to read! Not just for the new ones. Some bloggers still don’t understand these (for us) common sense principles.
I’ll follow with my blogging metaphor this weekend.
Love,
Mig
Great analogy. It fits so well.
Sue, Thomma Lynn, Mig, and Make Money,
Thanks for the comments and the compliments.
I grew up on a farm near a very small town, so moving to the “big city” was scary – just like starting to blog. I had no idea how many friends I would make.
Lillie,
This is a good entry! I like this picture of blogging.
Thanks Lillie. What a great way to look at blogging. Just like making new friends in the “real” world, it can be a little intimidating to make them in the virtual world. But you have to just step out and do it. And then you need to keep up with the contact. In order to make and keep friends you have to be a friend.
I’m glad you like the picture, Laura.
Helen, you’re so right about being a friend, and are a great example of this as you are always reaching out and sharing.
Lillie,
Very apt metaphor, highly thoughtful analysis, and truly insightful advice! Thanks for a wonderful post–one that can help the “newbies” among us better find our way in the incredible enormity of the blogosphere!
Your blogging friend,
Jeanne
Glad to have you as a new friend, Jeanne.
Hi Lillie
As usual you have used your word paintbrush to paint a wonderful picture with deft brushstrokes. This is a great analogy.
I look forward to reading all the entries in this group writing project.
Yvonne,
Thank you for the beautiful compliment!
I also look forward to reading all the entries. I’ve read a number of great ones so far, including yours.
Hi Lillie,
I love the part where you say that one day we wake and find the city that seemed so intimidating is made of small neighborhoods and communities. Gosh! That’s such a perfect description of the experience. Wonderful!
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Liz,
Thanks for the compliment and for starting this group writing project that has generated so many excellent entries.
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Great analogy! I, myself, see the blog as a fruit tree; growing from a seed — the idea — to this tree with fruits, some being more ripened than others.
A fruit tree is an excellent analogy. Some fruits are definitely more ripened than others.
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