Why we blog...

A blog tracking engine claims that there are over 108.6 million blogs on the internet. Why do people blog? A blog is like a diary. One can either hide one’s diary from people, or choose to show it to some people, or show it to everyone. The very fact that one publishes one’s writings online means that she/he wishes them to be read; if not by the uncomprehending many, then at least by the sympathetic few. This is why we publish online (if we could have, most of us would have shared our ideas in the form of a printed book). You may not be asking anyone to read what you write, but you do want someone out there to read, perhaps even understand, what you are saying.

This is why you blog, why the next person blogs. If not to be heard above the din of the mob (yes, that would be nice), then at least to have said what one feels should be said. It doesn't matter if it is an anonymous blog, like the faceless voice which is drowned out in the general cacophony. What matters is that you answered that call within you, urging you to speak your mind, however faint your voice may be.

It is this same urge that gave birth to the arts: to painting, and music, and poetry, and sculpture. It is this same urge that prompts the school-boy to scratch his initials on a desk. “GV was here”. We wish to leave something behind in this impermanent, changing world; something that lasts, if not forever, then perhaps a little longer than we did; something that establishes my identity: “I” did exist. A tiny insignificant mark analogous to our insignificant existence in this indifferent universe. But a mark, nonetheless. Undeniable.