Teaching Blogging Becoming Mainstream

Upon reading an article published by TheRecord.com (Blogging courses gain momentum) out of Vancouver Canada, I thought it was interesting that teaching people how to blog is turning up in course books across universities and college campuses. Gary Shilling who will be teaching a course about blogging and social media at B.C.’s Simon Fraser University describes the course as:

“The people we’re designing it for are people who perhaps are not terribly comfortable with technology, who have an interest in the medium but haven’t made those first steps to actually push the button,” Shilling says.

The course aims to teach people how to publish text, photos and video while also teaching how to write for the web. Of course, writing for the web is a tough business when you consider that people have short attention spans and you only have a few seconds of someones time to really catch their attention. It’s like fishing where the title of your post is generally the bait. Perhaps that is why the first few paragraphs of a blog post are considered the hook.

Other courses being taught around Canada include: “Internet Storytelling” at Nova Scotia Community College or “Introduction to Blogs” at Ontario’s Centennial College, and “Blogging for Business’ at the University of British Columbia. While this is a Canadian centric article, I’m almost certain that courses such as these are being taught all across the United States, perhaps even the world.

I think we are at the stage of the game where common folk are starting to hear the term ‘Blog‘ more and more and perhaps this is driving these individuals to look into what the word means and then what blogging is all about.

If this someone is you, let me give you a primer on blogging. For starters, a blog enables an individual to participate in the larger conversation that is always ongoing on the net. You can use your blog for more than just publishing thoughts, you can make a living, you can share your perspective on life, you can use it as a resume, you can make it your home away from home, etc. I could type what the definition of a blog is but I’d rather tell you what I think it is.

I think of a blog as an opportunity. You can shape this opportunity into anything you want but having a blog is like providing yourself an opportunity. When I took a more serious approach to blogging in 2007, I convinced myself that it would be a one year project, only to see where it would take me. Six months in, my blog presented me an opportunity for a paid writing position. Without my blog, I wouldn’t have had that opportunity. Each blog I write for, each time I hit that publish button, I am creating opportunities.

That is what blogs are, that is what they are capable of doing. Take advantage of the opportunity

Please share your thoughts with me on how blogging has presented opportunities for you throughout life. Did your blog give you the chance to make money? Did your blog give you the chance to make new friends and acquaintances? Did your blog enable you to extend your career? Let me know.