Tag Archives: blogging

Twitter Killed My Blog

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"Rewritten by machine and new technology,
and now I understand the problems you can see."

The Buggles – Video Killed the Radio Star

I realized today, with amazement, that it has almost been 3 months since my last blog post, and that this is just my 7th post since May.  This is by far the slowest blogging I have ever logged and I am a bit embarassed.

In parallel, I have probably been tweeting on average twice a day for the same period.

In short, Twitter has killed by blogging.  And I suspect I am not alone.

I also realized that I am not as good a blogger as I fancied myself to be.  When I analyze the 500+ blog entries I have written over the 5 year life span of this blog, I find that most of them are reflections on content that has been created elsewhere – mostly links and comments to others' blog posts,  videos, articles, etc.

In other words, they have been glorified ReTweets.  And the same act now takes me a few seconds (to retweet), as opposed to the 15-minute blocks of time that a blog post typically requires.

From now on, I'll stop fighting the natural flow and try to RT when that is all that's called for.  So this blog will probably see fewer entries but hopefully more original thinking.

If you enjoy hearing from me, you can follow me at http://twitter.com/csertoglu.

 

 

Blogging Intensity and Fragmentation

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On the heels of my post on why I blog, comes the updated VC blog rankings from Larry Cheng (I'm a N/A rated, dismal number 51!), and a good post by David Hornik on a tendency he identifies:

For years, my every thought became a VentureBlog post. But I have to
admit, over time, my focus turned elsewhere. I spoke at events,
podcast, taught, started The Lobby conference, and worked hard to help
my portfolio companies thrive. And, along the way, my blog suffered.
Fewer things in my daily life called out for commentary. And
VentureBlog began to languish.

I realize my blogging has suffered in frequency recently.  For me, this is largely due to changes in the way I communicate my professional thoughts.  Back in 2005, SortiPreneur used to be the sole channel I used to do this. However, now I use Facebook to broadcast to my friends and Twitter to reach my professional community.  When you add the fact that a Tweet takes a fraction of the effort a blog post takes,  I find myself asking whether a thought deserves a full blog post everytime I think about sharing it.

VCs Blogging and Tweeting

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Jeff Bussgang, whose blog has been a source of inspiration for me over the years, has a post on VCs blogging.  There seems to be a bit of controversy over the issue, as you can see in the comments of the post, and its re-blogs at PEHub and Business Week.

As a VC who blogs and tweets, let me come out with my reasons.

  1. Record of Thoughts: My blog is a personal note pad.  I find it useful to be able to browse over a record, albeit public, of my thoughts on certain topics and how they have evolved over time.
  2. Discussion Arena: I use Sortipreneur, even with its small audience, as a useful discussion environment.  Through my blog and my tweets, I am able to interact with a community where many members are smarter than me.  I use it to ask questions, test ideas and, sometimes, provoke.
  3. Newsfeed: My blog often works as the News tab for me.  I use it to announce investments, events, etc. that may be relevant or interesting to the Turkish startup community.
  4. Education: Probably the most selfish reason for my blog is that it helps me educate my consitutents and help me do my job easier.  I can communicate what type of deals I am interested in, the VC structure, the deal process, etc.

After about four and a half years of blogging, I can say I have benefited a lot from the activity. I beleive ideas grow thorough sharing and a blog is a great vehicle for that.