What is in Kelvin's Head?

Bloggers come and bloggers go

30/06/2012
It seems to me that the blogging world is changing at the moment. It seems as though there has been a slow down in the number of people starting new blogs and those who are keeping them may be keeping them slightly less often.

Twitter and Facebook updates (which are a form of micro-blogging) have superseded the one-line, one-thought blog post of yore and now people seem more likely to crank up their blog when they’ve got something significant to say rather than making posts morning, noon and night.

I think we are seeing some folk give up the habit too. That’s not really surprising. Bloggers come and bloggers go. The ones most likely to last seem often to be those who were early adopters – those who came to the blogging banquet early and have been sharing their wares for the longest time.

A lot of commenting has gone on to Facebook and twitter too. I’m so lucky to have people congregating around this blog who sometimes want to have a conversation. That’s often what keeps me going. I know that a blog works best when it stimulates a community though that does not stop it being a performance event.

I regret the move towards commenting on Facebook in some ways – often I post something here and post a link to in on Facebook to drive people to read it and then the conversation happens over there in semi-private rather than over here in public. I kind of understand why that happens but it is a sadness sometimes that people are not prepared to stand up and say good things out loud.

Trends I expect in blogging in the future –
- more blogs moving to longer blog posts
- more blogs moving to slightly less frequency
- better ways of linking the community element of blogging to Facebook and Twitter
- those who do make the effort to blog through this time will become even more influential in their sphere
- increasing attention being paid to quality of writing
I can’t quite make my mind up where we are going with video. I don’t think the videoblogging phenomena has much energy in it but suspect that being able to make and post video easily is increasingly a part of the story.

What do you think?
blogging

5 responses to “Heresy hunting”

Nick Brindley

14/05/2014

It is probably helpful to be clear about the distinction between “dogma” (which is best understood as the definition of orthodoxy and of heresy, of the things it is mandatory to affirm and the things it is forbidden to affirm) and “church order” (the rules about how people are to conduct themselves). These are related but by no means the same thing.

“Doctrine” is a third thing again, to my mind. It is the body of teaching that the church affirms but is much more extensive and changeable than dogma.

Of particular relevance is who has the authority to pronounce on these things. Denominational authorities quite properly establish church law and discipline (this needs to be done and there’s nobody else to do it) but would go beyond their proper sphere (in my view) if they tried to establish new definitions in the field of dogma.

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Andrew

14/05/2014

I feel the need to separate praxis and doctrine, but I suppose that is probably a minor heresy in itself, in a church that hides its doctrine in its liturgy. Although I suppose the deftness of the ‘McCarthy Liturgy’ has maybe sidestepped that pitfall as deftly as an 18th century non-juring bishop side-stepping western orthodoxy and the rest…

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Rosemary Hannah

15/05/2014

To a degree I think it is a matter of tradition. Anglican churches have tended (and it is only a tendency) to insist of orthopraxis. Church of Scotland churches have tended (same health warning) to emphasise orthodoxy of belief, call it doctrine or dogma. St Andrews is not of course a C or S institution, but it used to be, certainly in my day, and to a degree in yours, heavily steeped in C of S ethos. St Mary’s trained C of S ministers and that was ALL the training they got, because then they knew Orthodoxy.

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Jimmy

15/05/2014

The links on this post have led me to think of this –

The Inner Party – The Outer Party – The Proles.

The model demands tight control of the middle class, with ambitious Outer Party members neutralised via promotion to the Inner Party or “reintegration” by Miniluv, while proles can be allowed intellectual (and sexual) freedom because they lack intellect. Winston nonetheless believed that “the future belonged to the proles”. Wikipedia.

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Allan Ronald

19/05/2014

There was most definitely a C of S ethos at St Andrews in my day [67-71]. Robin Buchanan-Smith was running a packed college chapel and one president of the SRC and one president of the Union were St Mary’s men who went on to ordination and, in one case, to be Moderator of the Kirk. Perhaps they got their orthodoxy from Matthew Black at St Mary’s and their skill in future clerical politics from their student posts…….

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