Comments on: Better vs Different

By: Michael Moncur

Michael Moncur — Wed, 04 May 2005 19:55:37 +0000

I have a very focused weblog—in fact I have three very focused weblogs on very different topics at the moment, and am in the process of launching two more very focused weblogs. I have ideas for five or six others that will probably eventually appear.

I don’t know if this is a male trait, or an introvert trait (perhaps what Joe Clark meant above?) or if I’m on the verge of developing dissociative personality disorder… but this is how my brain wants to work, and it’s hard to think of doing things any other way.

That said, I do like it when a weblog has a bit of personality (not too much) beyond its core topic, and I’m trying to add more of “myself” to my writing. Some of my weblog personalities will find this easier than others, but it’s something to aspire to.

I suppose after I have nine or ten very focused weblogs on different topics, I can create a new one that uses RSS to pull in posts from all of them, and thus simulate the sort of well-rounded personality that you women seem to manage without any effort.

Anyway, Meri, good post, and it’s great to see some non-reactionary writing on the topic.

By: Meri

Meri — Tue, 03 May 2005 22:12:00 +0000

sQurl, I think that you’re perfectly correctly that the style can be gender-independent and I love the way that you describe it. However, my personal experience is that this is true of individual posts. When I just get a link through to an isolated post on someone’s blog, it is very difficult to tell. However, when you start looking at subscribing to a blog, then you see the broader focus, where the stuff I mentioned about about specificity comes back into play.

By: sQurl

sQurl — Tue, 03 May 2005 15:44:50 +0000

Excellent post, and one of the few good ones I’ve seen recognizing that different isn’t evil. As an addition to this though, have you thought about the fact that sometimes you don’t “see” more female tech bloggers, because you aren’t looking at the info to see if its a man or a woman writing? Most of the successful women I’ve see are that way because of a quiet and often understated confidence, not the glaring pink websites and purple websites. You mention this as “writing like men” above, but being confident, knowledgable and able to present a point on a topic doesn’t have to have an assignment of gender to it, unless the topic requires it.

By: Meri

Meri — Sun, 01 May 2005 13:45:02 +0000

Joe, what do you mean by inverts?

By: this is rachelandrew.co.uk » Diversity

this is rachelandrew.co.uk » Diversity — Tue, 26 Apr 2005 09:15:35 +0000

[...] April 26th, 2005 Diversity Posted by Rachel @ 9:13 am Meri Williams makes some excellent points about diversity and gives some re [...]

By: Joe Clark

Joe Clark — Sun, 24 Apr 2005 19:22:28 +0000

Of course, then there are the inverts.

By: Molly E. Holzschlag

Molly E. Holzschlag — Sat, 23 Apr 2005 06:38:06 +0000

EXCELLENT post, Meri. Really well done.

I just had a guy post to my site tonight about how he preferred women bloggers because essentially he found men to be too conscious of the importance of a blog post’s relevance and how it would be perceived by other bloggers, whereas he found women far more diverse in their post types and sense of expression.

However, I do think many men are quite natural online and reveal suprisingly intimate things. Eric is a prime example, his blog has always been a mix of personal and technical and it’s one of the things I adore about it. But he’s a rather Exceptional Human just in general, and he’s always been able to express his emotions.

I do agree that seeing the human side of the blogger is what makes following certain bloggers interesting. Yes, the technological and sociological essays are great, but without something of the human in there, it just doesn’t work for me.

Thanks for a great post!

Always,
Molly