Tuesday, November 21, 2006

what separates blog and an editorial ?? The great barrier reef !!



When you have nothing to do, thats the time you find everything to do. This is what exactly has spurred me on to start a blog. We all seek solace in something or the other. Thats because, we need to. The ventures to seek solace are many like mobile,i-pod,orkut,very kitschy indian cinema,hashish,cannabis,tequila and some argonauts- like the narrator of "the alchemy of desire"-in their beloved's body. I was not hedonistic enough to indulge in these activites- apart from orkut. So, ultimately when i was unemployed- and to some extent unemployable too- i found solace in the blog.
However, of late, i have started getting piqued about the efficacy of the blog. I would be forever indebted to the blog for fetching me a fair bit of female attention and quite a few memorable dates but; i am an aspiring journalist who seriously wants to take up writing as his metier. In such scenario will the blog be helping me ?? Well, thats the big question.

A blog gives you a sense of giocoso and you start getting too indulgent and ultimately the writer sounds like a prig. Economy of expression is never a tenet of a blog. A blog, i guess, caters more to the gentry and a blog's efficacy always comes under the shadow of doubt despite the fact that; it were the blogs which mollified the fears of mumbaikars during the deluge in the penultimate july. A blog is never taken too seriously and no matter what it still remains the fifth estate. "Alternative fourth estate" would have been a better cognomen. Monikers apart, a blog does not instill discipline. You are the master of your will and there will not be any master of the abattoir- more commonly known as editor- who would scythe your write-up.

One advantage of blog is that you can be scathingly vituperative and lampoons can be your leitmotifs. Where else can you call george bush names like slob, dickhead and what not; Condoleezza rice can be equated to the female equivalent of a canine from nowhere else but BLOG. The four letter word which starts with F can be liberally used as an appendage and it leaves quite an impact. Lets say, boys don't cry is a fuckin great movie. Superlatives like superb, fantastic do not give the desired impact like this four letter word. However, the newspapers very judiciously tend to use this word. Its shown as F**K. The reader must surely have been from the erstwhile pluto to decipher what lies instead of those two asterisks.

A blog gets you to archive your all write-ups and for some people like me a nice way to feel satisfied by looking at the comments. Till now, i sound more like a person who is in favour of blog but statistics upturn the odds in favour of newspapers. Statistics are like bikinis, they hide more than what they reveal. One such statistic is that out of every thousand homes only one home has a computer leave alone internet connection. In such a situation i would end up a scrivener with 15 comments and an update every 20 days. Everyone craves for attention and am no different. Its not that a newspaper will fetch me appreciation overnight but i can atleast hope.To surmise the whole thing. Erection is exciting because it comes and goes. A 24/7 hard-on is boring.

P.S: i am in no way demeaning the blogs of cnn-ibn or else those people who have left their full time jobs for the sake of blogging. Its just that i want to work under duress. However, it does feel good when someone asks me " What is the next thing that your writing about ? ".