shhh...i tell you a secret

some of you have replied to my previous post with very kind comments. many of you offered me words of advice along the line that i should not be so emotionally affected by negative comments. although i really appreciate your comments, i was wondering if some of you all have misread what i was trying to say? this post is an attempt to explain the motivations and articulation behind my previous post.

truth is, i was experimenting with different modes of articulation while blogging, and testing how persuasive they can be. i wasn't SERIOUSLY upset with the anonymous dude who left that comment, and i thought i indicated so when i said:

now, i am not saying this dude got me upset because he said stuff which was mean. nor am i saying, i've got a problem with him. actually, i'm not even sure what he meant by that comment.

nevertheless, a good deal of people just assumed that i was upset becoz of this anon dude, and i just reacted and ranted out of that. that wasn't really what really happened. although it was true that i was somewhat upset, i wasn't upset BECAUSE of this anon dude. i was upset because the more i thought about it, the lower the prospects of CRD thriving on the plogsophere.

at the same time, i decided to experiment with a different style of articulation. i always found that many people seem to agree with some other bloggers who adopted a more emotive style of argumentation. hence, i decided to tap into my feelings of upset (about the prospects of CRD in the plogosphere) and write a decidedly emotive post.

however, that wasn't all i wanted to experiment with. i wanted to intentionally provoke a certain kind of thinking by reading my post. which was why i intentionally asked questions such as "is this a rant post?", as well as explicitly soliciting comments on possible motivations for blogging.

the conclusions? my emotive approach probably was not very persuasive. everybody just felt the emotions but did not clearly read what i was saying, hence assuming that i was just reacting to the anon dude. probably this is not the fault of the readers, but the fact that emotive posts are somewhat very open to interpretation in the first place because of the lack of clear presentation of argument.

my attempts to provoke thinking were probably too subtle, or ill-placed. only one blogger responded noting that perhaps i wasn't really ranting, and i was hoping someone would produce the following objections to my post, but nobody really did (except maybe KTM):

- the plogosphere isn't as gloomy as i made it out to be. yes there is unhappiness when there is disagreement, but it is something that we can live with. it isn't necessarily so that there isn't enough space.

- the criticism of the WSM issue was unfair. it was mainly the netizens OUTSIDE the plogosphere (sammyboy forumers for eg) who drove WSM to close her blog, not people within the plogosphere.

- Elia Diodati could be wrong about "collective scrutiny of the blogosphere". The WSM case ought to be taken as a isolated incident because it involved an MP's daughter.

- "survival of the most anti-establishment" would be too unfair a comment about the plogosphere. there are many existing (and perhaps flourishing) blogs which are moderate, or pro-establishment.

i was also secretly hoping somebody would come up and tell me "pls dun stop blogging. we like to continue reading what you write". oh well. =/

i apologize to those of you who think that i was being sneaky and dishonest by having an ulterior motive or a personal agenda for blogging my previous post in such a fashion. it is however, my own blog, so i do think i reserve the right to blog in any manner i wish. but that said, i probably won't blog in such a manner again. i think it was not very fruitful nor productive (although it was somewhat fun and cathartic =P) i also think i've over-blogged in recent weeks on the topic of communication (or lack thereof) in the blogosphere, so i will stop blogging about that, at least for now.

some final food for thought:

- why did i blog THIS post?
- and why is this post tittled "shhh...i tell you a secret?"