A note and a question

[fpb]

The reason why I have been publishing little recently except for quotations from other people's articles is that I am very busy. I am slowly and painfully getting my books and comics out of storage, building or rebuilding bookcases to house them, and redesigning my flat. I rarely have time to properly blog.

Now, I have a question. I regularly refer to this LJ as "my blog" and what I do here as blogging. However, few other people seem to. I have just found out that one of the most lively, intelligent, productive, and, dammit, attractive members of my f-list (stand up and take a bow, synaesthete7), runs a blog separately from her LJ, on a different site, and describes only that as her blog. So I would like to ask, do you see a difference between LJs and blogs, or are they one and the same thing to you? And if you do, where does the difference lie?

Comments

[rfachir.livejournal.com]

LJs are blogs. Breaking it down more is for people with more time on their hands and specific needs. If all your friends are there for fic, and don't want to hear about politics, it might be sensible to set up two, so you don't spam the conservatives with liberal HP fanfic, but most folks I know are interested in the whole package. If my family blogged, I'd definitely set up another ID for them to read - and FLock all the posts so I could gossip freely with them.

[lazy-neutrino.livejournal.com]

I refer to it as my LJ but I regard myself as a blogger. Although there is also a confused assocation in my mind that "blogs=detailing real life", whereas that is not how I use LJ. But if I couldn't happily hold contradictory ideas at the same time, I wouldn't be human!

Hope that helps - but I doubt it!

[(Anonymous)]

I should add that the linking of blogs and real life comes from the fact that the media coverage of 'blogging' that I have seen is like that, so there is an association in my head. Whereas 'LJ' as a concept for me is a very different experience and quite often not connected with real life at all...!

[(Anonymous)]

And that's me - lazy_neutrino - again. Shouldn't have cleared all the cookies off my PC!

[super-pan.livejournal.com]

Well, I guess lj is blogging, but, at least among me and my f-list, it seems more of a way of actually communicating with other people, than just posting stuff on the internet, which I tend to think of blogging as being. So I don't know if there really is a difference, but there is a very small sliver of a difference in my mind.

Anyway, I was glad to hear you're getting your flat in order. It's so funny you gave us a little update on how you are, because I was almost about to post a nosy inquiry to several of my friends, to see how they were doing, or about things that I hadn't heard about much lately.

[sporty233.livejournal.com]

I agree with hafguk...I would see it as a combination of both. I personally use it as a kind of open diary..open at least to my lj friends. I use it sometimes as dustbin to express the sadness which I particularly went through in the last months and it helps. Under the bottomline it is great to get support back from friends, when you desperatly need it!
In addition, I have afterwards the perfect diary for myself after I am back in Europe...and who knows maybe my dream comes true and I will write a book out of all these entries! It would be worth doing it, I think! :)

[super-pan.livejournal.com]

Yeah, lj has been a great diary for me to remember my pregnancy high and low points. I used to write in a real diary years ago, but lj actually allows you to interact with others in their daily lives too, which I have found to be very nice.

[camillofan.livejournal.com]

I regard a LiveJournal as a blog. Perhaps because I didn't know anyone here ahead of time (except synaesthete7, and her only as an acquaintance), I didn't experience myself as joining a web community when I set up shop.

Like synaesthete7, I had a Blogspot blog before acquiring my LiveJournal-- though LJs were obviously cooler, back in those early days of the millennium you had to either pay money or receive an invitation to get one, while Blogger was free.

Unlike me, by the time synaesthere7 got her LJ, she'd already posted quite a bit to the Blogger blog and, knowing she had regular readers, decided not to abandon it, but instead to use the respective journals for different purposes (or so she said here).

I won't put words into her mouth, but I'll bet she doesn't call the LJ a blog because she was already calling the other blog her blog (but if I'm wrong, I'm curious to hear what she thinks is the difference!).

[fpb.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the explanation - I was not aware of the background facts.

Now on a completely different matter. Are you able to read the Don Camillo stories in Italian? If so, have you ever read the conclusion to the Fear cycle - after the ending of the first volume? It was never translated into English. If the answer to either question is "no", I will translate it myself just for you. I have already once had the pleasure (and it was a pleasure) to translate a great DC story previously unavailable in English: http://fpb.livejournal.com/11412.html

[camillofan.livejournal.com]

I cannot read Italian and would love to read your translation of the conclusion to the "Fear" cycle!