A Changing of the Blog
One of the few constants of this job is change. When I started out, web-serials were a fringe form of writing near the internet’s edges, audio was for traditional publishing only, and blogs were considered an essential part of any online author’s toolkit. To put it mildly, all of those elements have shifted in the decade-plus since I started posting my writing online. Serials are now getting an official program from Amazon on top of their own successful platforms, audio is an accessible essential for every author thanks to options like ACX, and as for the blog, I daresay I’m one of the last holdouts.
I’ve talked about it before, but for me, the blog has always been an indulgence; a place to put fun ideas that have no other outlet in regular stories or shorts. I kept it going even after they faded from use out of personal enjoyment, and while I do still have fun making them, I’ve been feeling for a while that it’s time for a change.
Cutting to the chase: The blogs will no longer be a weekly entry. I’m not getting rid of them entirely, however from this point on they’ll pop up intermittently, rather than every Friday. This wasn’t a choice I made easily, but after several weeks of pondering, I think it’s the best move.
Ultimately, it came down to a matter of timing. I’m not in my early 20s anymore; life asks a lot more of me, and I wear down easier. There are only so many hours of writing time I can utilize, and while I love the blog on weeks where I have something in mind, it can feel like misusing my time when I’m struggling to find an entry. Especially when I have other projects and ideas that could really use the attention.
That’s why I’m moving the blog to intermittent, so I can still put something up when I’ve got the inspiration. Otherwise I can put that energy toward a book-in-progress, a one-off idea, or just tinkering with something that might one day become a real story.
If you’re one of the people who enjoyed the Audio Blogs, I’m sorry to add that feature will be ending as well since there won’t be constant new content. If you’re one of my Patreons who enjoyed voting for those Audioblogs though, there is a silver lining! In reworking the Patreon to adjust for the removed audioblogs, I added one of the more requested features: a Discord server. It’s up and running right now, and so far we’re off to a fun start!
I’m tempted to do some sort of recap of the blog through the years, but that makes it seem like the end of this feature entirely, instead of just a schedule change. Besides, the best blog recap I could make already exists in the form of Underqualified Advice (and Other Amusing Diversions). And I think we all know that sooner or later, there’s bound to be another add from Kort, strange TV-land prison, or memo from Carol at Thunder Pear Publishing.
Thanks to everyone who has stayed with me through the years on this section of the site! I hope you enjoy the entries still to come, even if they arrive at irregular intervals.