Skip to main content

The Fun of Blogging


It’s been a pretty long liaison with blogging now.  I started it way back in 2001 when I bought my first desktop.  It was with Times of India’s blogging space that I began.  Soon I switched to Sulekha which offered many incentives.  Apart from the gift vouchers that came from Sulekha, there were quite a few committed bloggers there whom I really liked.  I got a fairly good share of readers too there.  But the love affair with Sulekha ended when a team of Right wing bloggers dominated the whole platform and started posting unsavoury comments with malicious intent.

Wordpress hosted my blogs after that for a few years.  Then something went wrong.  Apparently someone hacked or tried to hack my site.  It stopped working properly.  Then I migrated to Blogspot where I have remained for all these years.  But many of my fellow bloggers whom I read without fail stopped blogging for various reasons.  Some are in the family way, some immersed themselves totally in their careers, and some just gave up.  Maybe serious writers and thinkers lose interest in blogging because there are very few serious readers in that sphere.  My personal observation is that frivolous writing gets more readers in blogosphere.  I may be wrong, however.  Maybe I have not sought far and wide enough to discover serious bloggers.

Apart from those readers, I miss also the Happy Hours that IndiBlogger used to provide a few years ago.  Happy Hours brought a lot of gift vouchers with which I bought countless books from Flipkart. I wonder why that concept of Happy Hours died.  Maybe, some bloggers didn’t make use of it with sincerity and authenticity.  Maybe, the business concerns which provided the gift vouchers didn’t find it worth.  Maybe, there are other reasons.

Blogging, anyway, is personal writing to a large extent.  It is a personal gratification, at least.  It still remains that for me.  That’s the fun I have discovered in blogging.


PS. Written for IndiSpire Edition 188: #Blogging

Comments

  1. Good to know about your blogging journey.

    ReplyDelete
  2. It has hardly happened that I followed any other blogs seriously except yours. I don't remember how I ended up on your blog about a year ago, but ever since I am hooked and I read every article you post. They are so insightful and thought provoking, sometimes funny and sometimes melancholic!!
    I always wanted to start a blog and share my thoughts which are kind of inline to your thoughts and the way you see this world. I have just started my blog, a long way to go. You are such an inspiration... One day I wish to see blog grow like yours.
    Thank you so much :)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I'm flattered. Never imagined me as an inspiring blogger. Thanks a ton.

      Delete
  3. "Blogging, anyway, is personal writing to a large extent. It is a personal gratification"- Perhaps this is the reason you have lasted for so long!

    ReplyDelete
  4. I thought the left and right wing thing hadn't come to bloggosphere the way they had in social media, till I read about your Sulekha experience.

    And yes, I liked the happy hours and contests in Indiblogger. :)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Sulekha was run by some insane right wingers, I think. That's how it appeared.

      Let's hope indiblogger will revive the Happy Hours.

      Delete
  5. On certain occasions I have witnessed the rush of the bloggers to submit blog posts only to get goodies from that site. I hate being a part of that rush. Blogging for me has become more of a mood, a hobby which is strongly attached to the thoughts that linger in my mind for days. I hate being in the rush and write things just for the sake of vouchers .

    Having said that, I always wanted to know your blogging journey and glad to know now the starting point of that journey . you are really consistent with your passion. And I really find it worth praising.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. If bloggers were authentic those happy hours would have done much good...

      These days I'm becoming lazy. But I must persist and go on....

      Delete
  6. You are right Sir. I find blogging to be therapeutic as it helps one to articulate the million thoughts churning inside the mind. And yes, frivolous posts get the maximum likes..maybe because it's all about who is more active and "out there". Thank you for sharing your blogging journey here.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Blogging has also become just another social media where likes matter more than the content.

      Delete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Pranita a perverted genius

Bulldozer begins its work at Sawan Pranita was a perverted genius. She had Machiavelli’s brain, Octavian’s relentlessness, and Levin’s intellectual calibre. She could have worked wonders if she wanted. She could have created a beautiful world around her. She had the potential. Yet she chose to be a ruthless exterminator. She came to Sawan Public School just to kill it. A religious cult called Radha Soami Satsang Beas [RSSB] had taken over the school from its owner who had never visited the school for over 20 years. This owner, a prominent entrepreneur with a gargantuan ego, had come to the conclusion that the morality of the school’s staff was deviating from the wavelengths determined by him. Moreover, his one foot was inching towards the grave. I was also told that there were some domestic noises which were grating against his patriarchal sensibilities. One holy solution for all these was to hand over the school and its enormous campus (nearly 20 acres of land on the outskirts

Randeep the melody

Many people in this pic have made their presence in this A2Z series A phone call came from an unknown number the other day. “Is it okay to talk to you now, Sir?” The caller asked. The typical start of a conversation by an influencer. “What’s it about?” My usual response looking forward to something like: “I am so-and-so from such-and-such business firm…” And I would cut the call. But there was a surprise this time. “I am Randeep…” I recognised him instantly. His voice rang like a gentle music in my heart. Randeep was a student from the last class 12 batch of Sawan. One of my favourites. He is unforgettable. Both Maggie and I taught him at Sawan where he was a student from class 4 to 12. Nine years in a residential school create deep bonds between people, even between staff and students. Randeep was an ideal student. Good at everything yet very humble and spontaneous. He was a top sportsman and a prefect with eminent leadership. He had certain peculiar problems with academics. Ans

Queen of Religion

She looked like Queen Victoria in the latter’s youth but with a snow-white head. She was slim, fair and graceful. She always smiled but the smile had no life. Someone on the campus described it as a “plastic smile.” She was charming by physical appearance. Soon all of us on the Sawan school campus would realise how deceptive appearances were. Queen took over the administration of Sawan school on behalf of her religious cult RSSB [Radha Soami Satsang Beas]. A lot was said about RSSB in the previous post. Its godman Gurinder Singh Dhillon is now 70 years old. I don’t know whether age has mellowed his lust for land and wealth. Even at the age of 64, he was embroiled in a financial scam that led to the fall of two colossal business enterprises, Fortis Healthcare and Religare finance. That was just a couple of years after he had succeeded in making Sawan school vanish without a trace from Delhi which he did for the sake of adding the school’s twenty-odd acres of land to his existing hun

The Adventures of Toto as a comic strip

  'The Adventures of Toto' is an amusing story by Ruskin Bond. It is prescribed as a lesson in CBSE's English course for class 9. Maggie asked her students to do a project on some of the lessons and Femi George's work is what I would like to present here. Femi converted the story into a beautiful comic strip. Her work will speak for itself and let me present it below.  Femi George Student of Carmel Public School, Vazhakulam, Kerala Similar post: The Little Girl

Sanjay and other loyalists

AI-generated illustration Some people, especially those in politics, behave as if they are too great to have any contact with the ordinary folk. And they can get on with whoever comes to power on top irrespective of their ideologies and principles. Sanjay was one such person. He occupied some high places in Sawan school [see previous posts, especially P and Q ] merely because he knew how to play his cards more dexterously than ordinary politicians. Whoever came as principal, Sanjay would be there in the elite circle. He seemed to hold most people in contempt. His respect was reserved for the gentry. I belonged to the margins of Sawan society, in Sanjay’s assessment. So we hardly talked to each other. Looking back, I find it quite ludicrous to realise that Sanjay and I lived on the same campus 24x7 for a decade and a half without ever talking to each other except for official purposes.      Towards the end of our coexistence, Sawan had become a veritable hell. Power supply to the