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Doin’ it for the People

My first reaction when I looked at my referer logs and saw I’d been slashdotted was: Holy Shit! Actually it was Marc Canter’sPeopleAggregator that was the main link in the Slashdot article, but it was my interview with Marc that caused it. I’ve gotten 2000-odd visits from Slashdot so far (they’re still pouring in). This may not sound like much to some – but considering the second-best over the past year for this website was 200-odd visits in a day from a davedotting, it’s better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick.

It actually makes me realise what a small world we bloggers live in. There are many people out there who either don’t know weblogs exist or who think they’re “online diaries” (which is the description I hear most often from ‘normal’ people). But I’ve never been under any illusions that weblogging is anything but a minority sport.

Personal Publishing, on the other hand, has potential to break on through to the mainstream. As my interview with Marc illuminated, personal publishing is not just writing – it’s photos, music, movies, reviews, audio, etc. Multimedia. Anyone can create and participate. Anyone can be a producer, not just a consumer. I call it the Read/Write Web (btw that was my very first ‘official’ blog post – almost one year ago).

Another thing my interview with Marc taught me was that the people and content are the Kings of the Web. There’s been a bit of talk in the web designer world recently about focusing onpeople and not just tools. Jeffrey Zeldman asked today: “Can’t we all just get along?” – referring to the either/or arguments between web people such as semantic design vs effective design. And in the developer world, there’s the ongoing debate between simple vs complex – and variations thereof. But my specific point here is that, no matter what you’re developing or writing or composing or designing or just plain posting – the best results come when you do it for The People.

My interview with Marc is a good example – it looks like it entertained and perhaps even enlightened a lot of people (myself included). Sometimes I post silly little things that are probably only relevant to me – e.g. when I talk about my unpublished (and probably unpublishable) novel, or when I write about my hometown. I don’t do that too often, but when I do perhaps I am not thinking enough of my readers. The designers I linked to above – Keith, Paul, Zeldman – all have a habit of keeping their content focused on web design. Which is what their readers want to read and why I subscribe to them. There’s a lesson there for me.

So more interviews and less novel-gazing 馃槈 No seriously, I intend to supply you with further interesting web technology articles, mixed in with web design/development posts and some writing/sci-fi to keep everyone on their toes. Oh and a few more surprises of course!

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The ReadWrite Editorial policy involves closely monitoring the tech industry for major developments, new product launches, AI breakthroughs, video game releases and other newsworthy events. Editors assign relevant stories to staff writers or freelance contributors with expertise in each particular topic area. Before publication, articles go through a rigorous round of editing for accuracy, clarity, and to ensure adherence to ReadWrite's style guidelines.

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