Tuesday, June 07, 2005
Flashpost. I am toying with the idea of flashposting - a deliberate practice of putting up a post and then taking it down within 24 hours. I don't know if other people have thought of this before, but I enjoy the idea precisely because it breaks several key blogging rules: the temporal integrity of the entire blog as a text; the illusion that blogs are unedited (or, that editing is always flagged); a preference for online archiving rather than constantly replaced material.
The sort of posts I'll consider flashposting are emotive, rambling, diary-like, full of despair or anger. Just like moods, I'll inflict them on you and then they'll pass. Think of when you read back over old diary entries and the intensity of the mood that made you write them had passed, leaving only the faintly self-pitying words behind. Those words have always seemed an inadequate affective analogue to me.
The practice of flashposting seems like a good compromise. I can use the immediacy and editability of the blogging format for specific, affective purposes. And then the words don't have to hang around afterwards, archived, trackbacked, embarrassing me.
The sort of posts I'll consider flashposting are emotive, rambling, diary-like, full of despair or anger. Just like moods, I'll inflict them on you and then they'll pass. Think of when you read back over old diary entries and the intensity of the mood that made you write them had passed, leaving only the faintly self-pitying words behind. Those words have always seemed an inadequate affective analogue to me.
The practice of flashposting seems like a good compromise. I can use the immediacy and editability of the blogging format for specific, affective purposes. And then the words don't have to hang around afterwards, archived, trackbacked, embarrassing me.
