the challenge

I’ve decided to participate in the 2008 Comment Challenge! which is about challenging bloggers to become better blog citizens. I can see that this will need some energy and commitment but it’s something I’m prepared to invest in. I see it as personal and professional development.

I would class myself as a novice with regard to blogging and I’m only just beginning to understand the networking potential/possibilities that are afforded by responding to what I read on other blogs. I suppose I’ve been grazing for a while, dipping into a few places to read what I find interesting and informative. I see the value of doing the comment challenge in engaging with what I read (other people’s ideas/opinions/rants etc.) and having to think about how I respond to them. If I think I’ve got something to contribute, I’ll write a comment.

I’m hoping that after the month I’ll have a much deeper understanding of how the blogosphere works and where I may fit in this connected community. I hope to meet people and make authentic connections with those of like mind and having similar interests. These potential new relationships will be the BIG pay off. Proverbs 27:17 comes to mind when I think of how we need to interact with each other and bounce ideas around to come to deeper understanding of each other, ourselves and the world around us.

One of the other aspects of the blog/ger/ing learning curve is the need to choose from a range of application/technologies to maintain the connections – keep the lines of communication open if you will. I’m still discovering lots of things (as well as realising how much I don’t know) that will support and enhance my blogging and look forward to trying things out to see how well they work and how they might be put to use in an educational setting. I do subscribe to RSS feeds (using NetNewsWire for Mac) and have worked out that it’s important to also subscribe to comment feeds as well as the post feeds. If you’re not up to speed with RSS check out the and you may even find this video useful RSS in Plain English. [* note to self – must find out how to embed videos (I’m writing my blog posts in MacJournal) so I can post to the blog with having to edit the post there.]

I’ve also dived into Twitter and have had wonderful support from Sue Waters to get going (I’m using Twhirl to aggregate my Twitter ‘tweets’). This ‘instant message’ platform/technology/service is also starting to make sense in that we’re able to ‘keep connected’, and ‘in touch’.

How connected you keep is all up to you (and me).

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2 Responses to “the challenge”

  1. Sue Waters says:

    Welcome to the Comment Challenge! We are working hard to make sure the tasks too hard so they don’t become overwhelming. Glad your enjoying Twitter and always happy to provide support.

  2. Hi there, hope you have fun doing the challenge. best wishes Sarah

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