Do You Censor Your Blog?
Most of us start our blogs as a way to speak our minds and share with the world what we really think about a subject in our language. The restrictions placed on the mainstream media do not apply to us, and the internet has proven time and time again that those who freely speak their minds are often the most popular.
So what happens to your blog - your freedom of saying what you want, the way you want – when you are looking at the possibility of large scale syndication? What happens when you add advertisers? Is your blog still yours to do as you please? If you’re writing about a topic that upsets you, is it still okay to drop the f-word, or should you find a polite way of showing disgust and disrespect? Can we stay true to ourselves without limiting our chances of success?
We write because we want to entertain, inspire or share information with others. The more readers we have, the more people we are entertaining. But with that increase in readership and notoriety, do we change the way we write?
I’ll be the first to admit that there have been several times I’ve taken posts off this site because they might have been too inflamatory. More often than not, this involves scheduled posts that have not yet made it to the RSS feeds, but there have been two published posts that I have later taken down because of their tone. Why did I do it? Because the posts were phrased in such a way that I could have lost readership.
A prime example is a post that was written a few weeks ago about Zimbabwe’s ongoing problems. I had some very strong words about Mugabe’s decisions and piss-poor planning capabilities and wanted to get them off my chest. I’m an idiot. How I manage to walk and chew gum without falling over never ceases to amaze me, but even I know what happens when you destroy your agricultural industries and make decisions based on revenge rather than rational thinking. The post was entitled "How to Kill A Country in Only 8 Years" and, after reading it several times, it was taken off the scheduled release and sent into the dark recesses of the database. There wasn’t one positive thing said in the whole article.
Rarely will I use profanity on this site because it detracts readers from the point I’m trying to make (when I actually have a point to make). The same is true for spelling errors, poor grammar, and over-biased opinions. It’s been said time and time again that I can write some incredible articles when I sit down and put my mind into it, but the first thing people will critique above all else is how the language was used. This can be frustrating, but it comes with the territory, I guess.
What about you? At what price are you willing to alter your writing? Or do you refuse to change how you write for anyone, regardless of the consequences?
Comments (11)
Remember my old blog, Nice4Rice.com? Before I closed it, I made a post about 9-11 Truth. I had already written about it on my personal blog without worrying about the consequences, but to talk about it on Nice4Rice was a difficult decision to make. Obviously it was very controversial and not even related to the theme of blog, but I decided to go with it anyway. I got some hateful comments, but saw no drop in my readership at all. In fact, it’s been three weeks since I closed Nice4Rice and my Feedburner count is at 97, its highest ever!
You may turn away some of your current audience, but you may gain many more readers that share your opinion. You might even find your regular readers sticking with you based on your old articles, even if they disagree with one particular post. I say go for it!
Thanks, Nick. I might just hit “publish” on some of my less positive posts in the future. Before releasing the writing, though, I’ll be sure to clean up some of the language a bit to make sure my point isn’t misunderstood
Any buyers interested in Nice4Rice?
I had five or six people email me for a selling price, but I just told them all I wasn’t selling. It was a possibility at first, but when I thought about all the customization (i.e. uncommented code) and the special “rice” databases I set up, I decided it would just be too much hassle to fix up for someone else!
i think it depends on the purpose of your site. most intimate/controversial subjects to me i leave off msdanielle, although there are plenty of things i could say. if i threw networking to the wind, then maybe i’d throw in my views on the iraq war, religion, or a person’s sexual preference, etc… maybe someday i’ll create a diff site for that but for now it wouldn’t work in the current format of my blog (it’s more informational than “personal”)
Your site is excellent as it is. Informational, with a little bit of Binky and techno-parties. Considering your fan base, I’m sure readership would remain just as strong if you were to discuss political or more personal subjects. But you’re right that it would probably be better suited on a different blog.
As an aside, I’d like to say that both you and Gary are doing a great job with Creative Site Builders
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No, we don’t. What’s the use of a blog if you apply censorship to it?
There might be less of a need to censor a blog if we’re writing under a unique pseudonym. But what if there is a possibility for current or potential employers finding our writing? With a large number of companies now Googling their employees, our right to free speech could come back to bite us in the future
Say, what plugin does that nifty country flag, OS and browser thingie in the comments by the way?
It’s part of FireStats, a website stats collector that is more accurate than Google’s Analytics package. You can download it here. Once installed, you check off the comment icons flags in the “WordPress Options” tab