I've just been on the phone (ok. kidding, I've been in touch by e-mail :P ) with RT who agrees with me that comments on blogs can be a great motivation for blog authors. Nothing new about it, but I'm amazed that some of my best articles (from my viewpoint) haven't received much attention. They've been buried over a period of time receiving very little attention and I've always been bothered about it. Feels like a lot of wasted effort… I talked about blogs dying out recently and I feel that this is one of the reasons for it.
Sometimes, we need comments just to keep us inspired to write better. I know that I can never write in a vacuum (otherwise I'd just keep a personal notebook or diary) and I need people to respond to what I write. I cannot just "talk" to myself that way. But I have a feeling that increasingly the reciprocity of commenting that was once a norm among bloggers has now slowly disappeared. It's just that when I comment on another person's blog more than once and acknowledge it, it feels deflating if the other person doesn't respond. It's like spurning an invitation to dinner or lunch in the real world. Even a polite "no" would be better than no response at all.
As a writer, I know that I write some of my best articles/essays when I feel that people are responsive to it. It might be one person who inspires the writing or it might be a whole community. In my case, even half-a-dozen readers are enough to keep me at it all the time. I feel extremely grateful whenever somebody else takes their time to read, understand and more importantly respond.
I know it's not always possible, but if you do like something you read on any blog, please comment and especially if you are a blog author yourself. Many of the popular bloggers seem to take their readers for granted, but for whatever reason they seem to get more and more popular. I don't want to emulate those people. Like RT I value even a single reader and if that can inspire me to write another good piece, I appreciate the contribution which led to it.
Hari writes about a wide variety of topics on his own blog, including "Humour, comics, tech, software, reviews, essays, articles and HOWTOs intermingled with random philosophy now and then".
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This article is published as: If you like what you read, comment
Loved the post. I tend to spend more time visiting other blogs and commenting rather than writing. That's the way it's supposed to be, at least in my opinion.
Thanks Shrinidhi. Interesting thoughts there.
Brown Baron, thanks for your views.