After #sarnackigate (and helped by a busy week) I thought I would take this week to do something that I’ve been meaning to do: bring my first blog post over from the initial home of my blog to its new home.

Why I decided to try blogging

I have been thinking about starting a blog for a little while now. I registered a WordPress account to use on the WHA’s Digital Frontiers blog for the WHA’s 2010 meeting, which gave my abstract thoughts some concrete possibilities. Although since it is now 2011, I clearly dragged my feet, (mostly fearing I would prove true the saying “Better to remain silent and thought a fool, than to speak and remove all doubt”) but with some encouragement from friends I have decided to test the waters.

I thought for my first post I would explain (and weigh) my motivations behind blogging in hopes of explaining my blog (or at least how I envision it right now):

50% (Academic) Self-Improvement – The main reason I have starting a blog is because I think the experience will benefit me. While I hope blogging semi-consistently will help my writing skills, I am more interested in improving my ideas and creative thinking more generally. I intend this blog to be a place where I can play with ideas, voicing and developing them, while occasionally making silly comparisons in the name of trying to conceptualize my work as a historian and digital historian in different ways. I envision my posts as starting points for contemplation and (hopefully) conversation. I fully expect to contradict myself and use less than ideal grammar at times (though I will try not to), but I hope articulating some of my thoughts will lead to new and improved ideas that will ultimately benefit me in the long run.

35% Digital Presence – It seems a pretty obvious point now that people in any field should try and manage their presence online. Especially with a relatively uncommon name, I attempt to make sure anyone Google-ing me will find relevant (and positive) information. Currently, my department website and twitter account are the first two results, about which I am rather pleased. Using a blog as another way to build my online presence is inspired by the blogging of other academics and in-person conversations, or both as is the case with Jason Heppler.

5% Ego – Everyone thinks they have something important to say and I am no exception. I think highly enough of myself to move my internal rants and scribbles on scraps of paper to a public forum.

5% Bored – My relationship with the internet has been going a little stale recently. My addiction to Twitter has been growing since I joined in August, but aside from that I have been trying to cut down on my time-wasting websites (including Facebook), which has led to checking the same news websites and email accounts constantly. Any resistance I had to blogging has been worn down given I have nothing better to do (online).

5% Procrastination – Even though I just said I have been trying to reduce my time-wasting, I am still a chronic procrastinator. I certainly do not need another excuse to procrastinate, but hopefully this medium will make my reluctance to be productive somewhat useful.