Would you want your fave author/muso/creative type to have a blog? Would you read it?

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I was thinking about this earlier, that we've reached the point where damn near everybody has one of these things, but there's still a class of folks who do not.

Which of your fave creative type would you want to do a blog? Either a link-heavy one, or one filled with topical commentary on a frequent basis?

For example, I think it'd be great to read one done by James Burke, or Jarvis Cocker, or Neil Stephenson. Not just wanky little "check this funny picture!" stuff, but actual content...

Would it reveal too much or take away any mystique from that creative type to have them that accessible or prolific?

― kingfish du lac (kingfish 2.0), Thursday, 22 June 2006 20:23 (twenty years ago)

I think in all likelihood they would quickly devolve into "check out this funny picture!" no matter how creative they are.

― Shakey Mo Collier (Shakey Mo Collier), Thursday, 22 June 2006 20:25 (twenty years ago)

A friend of mine is a big Kristin Hersh fan, but he gets a bit upset at how much of the nuttier side of her personality is on display in her blog [to oversimplify things].

― Casuistry (Chris P), Thursday, 22 June 2006 20:29 (twenty years ago)

That's part of the thing, the revealing. I mean, Rosie Odonnel's blog was pretty shocking to folks, right?

― kingfish du lac (kingfish 2.0), Thursday, 22 June 2006 20:31 (twenty years ago)

would it tell you a little too much about whomever?

― kingfish du lac (kingfish 2.0), Thursday, 22 June 2006 20:32 (twenty years ago)

And I think that there are some instance with this accessibility that help, like Tom Clancy posting in his own usenet group for several years in the '90s.

― kingfish du lac (kingfish 2.0), Thursday, 22 June 2006 20:42 (twenty years ago)

Kurt Vonnegut's later books and articles are basically blogs.

― chap who would dare to be a nerd, not a geek (chap), Thursday, 22 June 2006 22:43 (twenty years ago)

I love the idea of a Chip Delany blog. Comics + pr0n + semiotics + SF.

― Offisa Pump (Rock Hardy), Thursday, 22 June 2006 22:52 (twenty years ago)

No. No.

― Dadaismus (Dada), Friday, 23 June 2006 08:54 (twenty years ago)

I think blogs do remove some of the mystique. I read David Byrne's, but I'm not really interested in what he does musically these days. Likewise, Momus's blog is a good read, and yet perversely since reading it I no longer feel any desire to check out his music. Art and cultural commentary somehow don't go hand-in-hand.

― Revivalist (Revivalist), Friday, 23 June 2006 09:16 (twenty years ago)

Thom Yorke's blog is the best reason in the world for this to be a VERY bad thing.

― Kv_nol (Kv_nol), Friday, 23 June 2006 10:16 (twenty years ago)

one of my favourite living writers has a blog, and i do read it.

you guessed right: dom passantino.

― Roughage Crew (Enrique), Friday, 23 June 2006 10:19 (twenty years ago)

wouldnt yr favourite artist try too hard to present his typing in some sort of stylistic fasion eg all in lowercase and no punctuation that sort of thing ay

― mark grout (mark grout), Friday, 23 June 2006 10:20 (twenty years ago)

It's simple, I don't read anyone's blogs

― Dadaismus (Dada), Friday, 23 June 2006 10:21 (twenty years ago)

get you!

― Roughage Crew (Enrique), Friday, 23 June 2006 10:59 (twenty years ago)

Jim Woodring does have a blog, and do I read it and it's mostly just "check out this funny picture I MADE" which is totally appropriate for a visual artist.

http://www.jimwoodring.blogspot.com

Hells yuh.

― 100% CHAMPS with a Yes! Attitude. (Austin, Still), Friday, 23 June 2006 11:26 (twenty years ago)

One of my favorite poets has a blog, which is one of the most famous poetry criticism blogs out there, which has sparked hundreds of other poetry blogs, etc., etc. And I do read it. It's not as good as his poetry. It is better than most poetry criticism blogs.

― Casuistry (Chris P), Friday, 23 June 2006 11:37 (twenty years ago)

one of my favorite game makers has a blog, where he pretty much took over his company's news page to post about whatever he felt like, be it the company's new kitten, his fingernails, freaking out about New Orleans, pictures of him tearing out office walls, whoring their new promo yo-yos, etc.

I mean, it doesn't get down to the quotidian "went to the grocery store today, bought beer" matters, but it's still regular enough to be worthwhile.

Maybe that's the deciding point, in terms of what content they actually write about. Whether they go on about the boring shit they did that particular day vs something something far more substantive on perhaps a less regular basis.

― kingfish du lac (kingfish 2.0), Friday, 23 June 2006 15:05 (twenty years ago)

I attended a taping of Wait Wait Don't Tell Me last night, and sportswriter Charlie Pierce was foaming about Mark Cuban's blog, complaining that it was all in lower-case and with no apostrophes. He said, "If it talked more about Natasha Bedingfield, I'd have thought it was my daughter's."

― jaymc (jaymc), Friday, 23 June 2006 15:08 (twenty years ago)

William Gibson had one (that i never read) that was meant to be very good but he stopped it (temporarily?) because it interfered with getting any proper writing done. Neil Gaiman's is also meant to be good but, again, i don't read it.

― koogy wonderland (koogs), Friday, 23 June 2006 16:21 (twenty years ago)

charlie pierce is one of my favorite writers ever, sports or not. i used to love when he'd write stuff for the phoenix.

― otto midnight (otto midnight), Friday, 23 June 2006 16:22 (twenty years ago)

Gaiman's blog IS good. He comes across as a nice fella.

― chap who would dare to be a nerd, not a geek (chap), Friday, 23 June 2006 16:28 (twenty years ago)

then again, you have RuPaul, and i'm not sure if this is a positive or a negative

― kingfish du lac (kingfish 2.0), Wednesday, 28 June 2006 00:59 (nineteen years ago)

I think Billy West is great, but on his site forum, to which he regularly contributes, he frequently goes off his trolly at people, gets angry at Ren and Stimpy troll/fans, bans people, etc. It kinda made me go "er. he's odd". But still, I like reading that kind of stuff.

Now I want to go find Kristin Hersh's blog and see what's going on!

― Trayce (trayce), Wednesday, 28 June 2006 01:07 (nineteen years ago)

I think 'check out this silly picture' from a famous person would be better than a famous person doing a self-important blog. It'd be like Momus's blog, only I might care.

Sara Gran (ok but not great author, I found the blog looking up her second novel) has a fairly interesting one - a little publishing cattiness, what books she's reading and talking about them. She's famous enough to make one for people she doesn't know at all, but not too famous for that to get in the way.

― milo z (mlp), Wednesday, 28 June 2006 01:10 (nineteen years ago)

Rupaul's blog is great!
It has this: http://www.careerbuilder.com/monk-e-mail/?mid=10817270

― Forksclovetofu (Forksclovetofu), Wednesday, 28 June 2006 01:13 (nineteen years ago)

Oh the other blog-of-sorts I do like to read is Roman Dirge's livejournal. He usually only posts art, but sometimes funny tour stories.. and the other day, the story of the heart attack he had, shrugged off, and posted about on the internet.

Damn goths.

― Trayce (trayce), Wednesday, 28 June 2006 01:13 (nineteen years ago)

Dadaismus has the right idea.

― Abbadavid Berman (Hurting), Wednesday, 28 June 2006 01:39 (nineteen years ago)

Gaiman comes across as a self-absorbed cock. And also a nice fella.

― Andrew Farrell (afarrell), Wednesday, 28 June 2006 06:15 (nineteen years ago)

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