The Evils of Reblogging

So Bryan goes on his merry way. With everything going on in the blogosphere as of late (Derek and his footer fetish (which for some reason is a "new" thing), Blog networks up the ass (or "we make money off your brain schemes"), etc.) I choose to defer my thoughts to others. Why? Not because I'm ignorant, because I think there are others who do a much better job wasting their time and sounding better talking about these issues than I am. Besides, I'm trying my best not to fill that reblog category. It's the one category that all other categories hate.

Let's talk about why reblogging should be kept at a minimum. In the immortal words of Facebook's CEO:

I agree with him. Why?

Reblogging is the bane of originality and reblogging shows no skill.

To set the record straight, in my view, if you talk about a widely discussed subject and provide your own original opinion - that's not reblogging. Most people use reblogging to show their interest in a particular story. But what's wrong with this is that most of people copy the source verbatim. So great, all I'm seeing is a post which I could have read somewhere else (or had already read somewhere else) but it happened to be "copied by: Jake." Seriously, when somebody reblogs, WordPress should sense this and change "written by" to "copied by." Harsh, I know, but true maybe?

Just like if you were to submit a plagiarized essay to your english teacher, there's no skill required to copy somebody else's words, online or offline. Now, if you could build on that and quote the source, then you're on to something. But unfortunately, many people don't have much time to be original.

Constant reblogging deteriorates from a blog's quality.

I firmly believe this. Nothing's worse than a person who talks about everybody else all the time, and the same goes for blogs. I catch myself thinking if there's actually a person behind some of these designs, because all I see is an over publicized story. One after another, after another. Soon, you just don't want to see what this person has to say, because he's just an echo anyway. But when that author comes up with something original, it would have been too late for my eyes. A great alternative would be to show your de.licio.us feed at the side (or the bottom) of your blog, away from your thought canvas.

Don't be a brainless, soulless reblogger.

I've learned that it's not about quantity. Many authors have built up great followings by producing one or two great, thought-invoking posts per month. But then on the other hand, don't be the boy who cried wolf, and never post (although you said you would). Give life to your posts. Even if you run into a story that you just have to let your friends know about, add to it, make it yours. Surely your friends and fellow readers would appreciate your raw view on the issue you were dying to talk about. Don't post just to post. Wordpress doesn't need the extra abuse, and neither do you. Give the database something worthwhile to store, and you'll both be better for it in the end.