Does the quote "specialization is for insects" apply to something like blogging? Before I delve into the answer to that question, let me give you some background.
Specialization is for insects.
As I was explaining to my 22-year old son about being able to do more than just one thing at one time and being able to do all of them well, I used a familiar quote: "Specialization is for insects." A while later, I became interested in knowing where I'd heard or read it before. I remembered it as a tagline at One Mans Blog, but I knew it originally came from somewhere else. After I "googled it", I found that it came from a book, "Time Enough For Love" by Robert A. Heinlein. A book that I've never read. Here's the full quote:
"A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects."
Does this apply to blogging?
Insects specialize. Observe how ants and various other bugs live and operate. They do the same things over and over again in the same way. They may move from location to location, but the behavior remains consistent.
I've yet to read a blog, even a so-called "niche" blog, where the author(s) do the same things over and over again. On second thought, yes I have. Video blogs, picture blogs and specific blogs like those all continue to operate in the same manner. That's because they have a singular purpose. They're not the kind of blogs I'm talking about. I'm talking about the blogs where the main content is text.
This blog isn't written by an insect.
As much as I would like to be able to focus on one particular topic all the time, I find it incredibly boring. There are blogs that specialize in blogging about blogging, making money online, technology, Internet marketing and a whole slew of other topics. Do you want to know something? I can't read any one of them every single day. They bore me to tears.
There's nothing wrong in being a blog specialist. We need those kinds of blogs as information storehouses. We also need blogs that don't specialize on any one topic. They're the blogs that make the rest of them bearable. I have other blogs that focus on specialty topics, but even those blogs vary in content.
So tell me, are you an insect?
I read that book as a teen. It was a really good book, as all Heinlein books are (but The Door Into Summer is my favorite by a lot).
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