Are you an avid blogger *coughs* …I mean…occasional blogger who really enjoys creating noise in the blogosphere? Nick Earls’ recent post about his conundrum has let me to pause and wonder why on earth am I spending time typing my little heart out?

Nick’s thoughts entails finding a balance between being active on social media developing your “author platform”, writing novels and selling books. Point one and three are often regarded as synonyms. Nick points out that sales figures prove social media doesn’t equate to more sales.

Here is where I pause and wonder, as a writer working on books myself – why do I spent time on the internet to talk about the fact that I’m writing a book? I shall post my reasons whenever I can think of one.

REASON #1
Writing diary: Because I’m a self-centred exhibitionist (am I?)

Through my first blog Travel Tales I have learned how hard it is to build a regular readership. The truth is I never started a blog thinking many people ever read it. For me the blog was a way of capturing experiences and share them with my friends (and mostly they have little interest and I don’t mind).

Why start a second blog if the first one is hard to sustain? Well, this place here is my writing diary, an outlet to write something every day *coughs*…I mean… often and reflect on what I’ve created so far.

Is this terribly self-centred and exhibitionistic? You betcha! Is it unusual for writers to display such behaviour? Absolutely not! Writers have always used diaries as a way to establish a writing routine, collect and play with ideas.

In fact, many writers’  diaries and letters have been published posthumously thus are available to the public. Some writers in the twentieth century (and earlier) even knew this would happen and wrote their diaries trying to wash as little dirty laundry as possible – or maybe extra loads since they didn’t have to worry about repercussions.

Whether we like it or not, one characteristic of our time is many things happen instantly through communication technology: news, voicing of opinions, exchange of information – why shouldn’t a writer’s diary be instant?