I started this blog a bit over six months ago (six months and three days, I believe). It is not my first one (I really lost it on the previous one when it got semi popular and unmanageable, paired with the fact that my personal life was in turmoil due to being overworked and over travelled). So, by the end of June 2010, I realized I missed having a regular blog. I wasn’t sure how I wanted to tackle it, mainly because I didn’t want the constrains of just one subject. I tend to get bored having to wade through only certain topics to find worthwhile stuff to post. So, I decided politics was broad enough to be able to include everything that interests me: from pure, traditional politics to feminism to pop culture, media, marketing (and the politics of marketing and media representation), to art and some tongue in cheek trivia. In brief, the stuff that makes me who I am, hoping that others will find it interesting enough to read it.
But it was Tumblr itself that made it the experience it became. The fact that this blog doesn’t exist in isolation but as part of a group and a community of other bloggers who allow feedback and participation. It makes the experience of blogging much more interesting and dynamic than just posting content hoping that someone will leave a comment. I am less interested in such medium (which is common in other platforms like WordPress or Blogger), than I am in the dialogs that stem from other Tumblrs, who pick up whatever we put out there and enrich it with more commentary, dissent and agreements, allowing, in turn, that we do the same. Without that cycle of regular feedback, this would be just another isolated blog out there, with some readers (perhaps) and a lot of navel gazing because I wouldn’t know what makes people tick.
So, in the interest of some personal balance, I got way more than I expected in these six months. Way more. And I am forever grateful to everyone who reads, who comments, who allows me to participate and contribute. In these six months I have achieved quite some on a personal blogging level:
- Had my writing blogged on Racialicious (a site I have admired for years for their cultural analysis of race and social matters)
- Been featured in Sociological Images (yet another site I never expected to contribute to, mainly due to its enormous fan base)
- Tiger Beatdown sent me more traffic than I ever dreamed of (I loved Sady before, so this is by no means a recognition due to the traffic)
- Was interviewed for the Council of Europe’s podcast about feminism in Europe
- Helen Bop (someone I also admire very much for her courage and relentless pursuit of rights, justice and gender equality) also sent me more traffic than I could have hoped for.
- A group of smart women started Persephone Magazine and they regularly feature my sleep deprived ramblings
- As of this writing, Analytics tells me there are almost 30,000 links to this blog out there (that is, links included in other sites who quote, recommend or just post something related to this domain). For the big blogging powerhouses, this figure might seem trivial. For me, that I only started a few months ago, this is quite a personal achievement.
- I have acquired hundreds of followers (to whom I am really grateful, because you all bother to read what I put out there which I never thought would garner an interest).
- I found out I have a few dozen subscribers through RSS feed. Again, people who find this interesting enough to add the URL to their readers. I may not know you personally, but it gives me a warm, fuzzy feeling to know there are people out there reading.
So yeah, many words to just say thank you. It’s been a difficult year for me healthwise (it is getting better, though). And this blog helped me get through some of the worst of it. So, again, thank you all. I promise I’ll do my best to keep you all amused, infuriated, entertained or just distracted while you are supposed to be working or studying. After all, I blog against corporate dominance, helping one bored office worker at a time.
For the past decade and a half I have been making all my content available for free (and never behind a paywall) as an ongoing practice of ephemeral publishing. This site is no exception. If you wish to help offset my labor costs, you can donate on Paypal or you can subscribe to Patreon where I will not be putting my posts behind a lock but you'd be helping me continue making this work available for everyone. Thank you. Follow me on Twitter for new post updates.