Cooperative Media

One thing stood out in Kathleen Parker’s rant. (See prior post)
was her complaint about bloggers promoting one another.

It deserves some discussion, but Blogging as it exists today is a non-competitive world. I got around 900 hits from Michelle Malkin linking to me, about 300 from Wizbang, and 300 from All Things Beautiful. Others have gotten hits through me. Really, contrary to being “Lord of the Flies” our current blogosphere is practically Utopia.

If I want my blog to be a success, I don’t need to steal Instapundit’s audience, I need to develop my own and then figure out how to monetize the blog if my goal’s making money.

The other cool thing about a blog is that people can read me and they can read a dozen other blogs, so gaining readers through one blog doesn’t mean another blog’s losing. Its not a zero sum game.

Being a good blogger, becoming a better more successful blogger is about helping others out, giving credit when credit’s due instead of being the one with the big scoop. Part of the reason, I started so slow, is I had no clue where to start. I remember the early days of the blog when I would search every other week to see if anyone other than Radical Russ had linked to me. Now, with around 230 blogs having a link to me somewhere, I’ve got a different outlook. I got those links, because of linking to others, hosting trackback parties, getting people to come to my site and read my stuff.

From this, you can see its really a much nicer world in the blogosphere than in the mainstream press or most other occupations.

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