THE MISSING WORD

There’s a word missing.

We know what a blog is . . .  a site with a structure defined by date rather than by content.

And we know what a post is - a single submission to that blog.

Well, that says a lot, doesn’t it!

Sometimes people call a ‘post’ a ‘blog’ which is confusing but not surprising. The word ‘blog’ has its roots in ‘log’ and you can ‘log a log in a log’. It’s irritating though (one of life’s little trials) because it isn’t always clear, when people say I like (or don’t like) your blog . . . whether they are talking about the blog itself or just one entry in it.

I’m risking being a really, really, real bore by going on about this because I want to draw attention to a word which isn’t there, a word which doesn’t exist - a word for the collection of blogs each individual forms into a virtual magazine of their own devising.

Some people will be specialists and, for instance, might read only blogs about orchid growing, or lilies. Others will create a gardening magazine which ranges round plants and soils and tools and seeds and places to visit; or gather articles about art, or politics. Yet others will create almost a Sunday supplement - a bit of gardening, a bit of art, some stories, pictures, politics and reviews. They might throw in a few online newspaper articles too - material from sites which aren’t blogs. But, regardless of how one reads, there’s no word for the self-created magazine one relies on for interest, entertainment, information and inspiration.

There are a few approximations - ‘Reading List’, ‘Blog Roll’ - but I suspect that for many of us, there’s a much valued core, the magazine proper, which needs a word. Sometimes I write down a list of the blogs I want to pay special attention to, so I don’t get drawn off track. Some bloggers are better at replying to comments than others, or eliciting extra visits, and it’s easy to get sucked in. Fine. Indeed, this is exactly what some readers are looking for - a sense of common purpose and shared interests. But the big, popular blogs aren’t the only ones I like to read. I don’t want them to draw me away from interesting blogs with a less efficient ‘pull’ or a less clearly defined or overlapping readership. And, sometimes, I find myself reading blogs because I sense the writers will be sad if they don’t get lots of responses. Reading can become a sort of charitable action. (That’s ok, but only in small doses.)

My self-created on-line magazine includes non-gardening blogs like

Pearl, Why You Little

And

Apocalypse Now

And

The Idle Historian

And a blog I've only just discovered but which is full of wonderful things

Shakespeare's England - Everyday Life in Seventeenth Century London.

There’s

The Big Picture

from the Boston Globe

And NASA’s

Astronomy Picture of the Day.

Hermes'

19th and 20th Century Images

is a fascinating collection.

I make occasional forays into

The New Scientist

And

The Dorset Echo

In my gardening section . . . no . . . I’ll not tell you any from my inner core there . . . it might be undiplomatic! (Except that it took me a long while to realise the blogger at

Houston in Black and White

is none other than David at

Tropical Texana).

Kitty at

Into My Own

doesn’t post enough

but Mo at

Fresh Eyes on London

manages to publish wonderfully interesting and perceptive pictures every day.

I don’t want to give my full list - it’s long - but I do want a name for this magazine that exists only in my head and on my computer. Do you have a name for yours?

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