Hey, Pamie: “Is it okay that I’m a blogger?”

I haven’t been procrastinating on the weekly procrastination series. I’ve been busy. You see, a holiday tradition in Hollywood is that producers and studios and networks and publishers finish their to-do lists so that they can go off on their vacations and trips to the parents and Hawaiian safaris and nightly festivities. This means all of my hurry-up-and-wait comes to a screeching halt, as it’s time to Hear Notes and Write.

I debated showing a picture here of the stack of work beside me, but I wouldn’t want you to get jealous. I’m about to have a lot of late nights and airplane writing stretches. This is a good thing! This is being a writer. We work through most major events and holidays. It’s why you think we don’t appreciate you and ultimately leave us.

Let’s get to the question of the week.

[readermail]
Hi Pamie,

First, I think it’s very cool of you to offer your writing insights to us. Not only do you answer our questions, but you really take care in doing so with thoughtful and helpful responses. In fact, I’ve emailed you a couple times over the years and you were always responsive and friendly. So, thanks!

My question(s) for you have to do with blogging. First, I always wondered why you don’t try to generate a little extra income by monetizing your blog. Second, I wanted to know your thoughts of blogging. When people ask me what kind of writing I do, I’m always like, (cough) I have a blog (cough). Like blogging isn’t legitimate writing. Except, I love to blog. Which leads me to my last question, is there any other type of “legitimate” writing you would recommend for a blogger like me to try?

s.i.
[/readermail]

First of all, thank you for the compliment. I remember you because I like the name of your website.

Okay, so why don’t I monetize my blog? Well, there are a few reasons. I don’t know how long you’ve been around here, but I did monetize my blog, way back in 2000, when I was part of a “portal” called “Chick Click” and I had a tiny banner at the top of my website. It made some people go batshit. That wasn’t the problem. The problem was eventually there was a dot com bust and Chick Click folded. For a long time after that there weren’t a lot of options for a website like mine unless I jammed it full of Amazon links. And people were saying the internet was dead and that nobody liked a blog unless it was a news ticker site.

My site’s kind of like that corner market that sells weird foods where you’re like, “Oh, my god, that store is still around? It’s been thirteen years! WHO SHOPS THERE?”

These days lots of people make money off their websites, and while I have been tempted and even had a conversation or two about it, part of why I haven’t aggressively pursued it is that I’m not really a blogger, not in the way a blogger is perceived today. I don’t update every single day, I don’t curate links or offer helpful tips. Aside from the yearly charity and this new advice column, I’m not usually offering a service. This is my side site used for promotion, publicity, silliness, and a connection with my readers that might just be my abandonment issues presented in binary code. Most importantly, because I have this giant stack next to me of things that are due to people who are paying me money to do them, I don’t always have time to come to this site to write. I’d feel guilty if I wasn’t updating enough to merit the hustle it takes to successfully run ads.

This leads to the second part of your question. You identify yourself as a blogger, but then you’re embarrassed by it. That’s so unnecessary. This new generation of blogs and women who blog are powerful and amazing and take their sites and turn them into businesses. Brands. Money-making machines. Why would you be embarrassed to be a part of that? I don’t know how to give advice on how to market/improve your blog in this current climate so that you can start to make income through it, but maybe people will give you some help in the comments.

Back in 1999, when I decided I wanted pamie.com to make money so that I could transition to writing freelance full-time, I made a plan. I went to sites that were running ads with a similar tone, with a similar sensibility, and I paid attention to what they were doing. I went to SXSW Interactive and networked with the intention of turning my site into something that could be bigger than the online journal I had created. I started a forum, I got focused on what I was writing about, I made sure I was searchable and my site was listed near other sites like mine. (There were things called Web Rings back then. Don’t worry about it.) Not exactly like mine. That’s important. Make sure you’re using your own voice and don’t try to fit into what you think someone wants you to say or sound like. Nobody needs you to be somebody else. The best thing about your website is it’s the one place where you get to be exactly who you are… if that’s what you choose to do with it.

So maybe go to sites like BlogHer or conferences like SXSW Interactive and find out what you think is “legitimate” writing. Submit yourself to essay-friendly sites like Hello Giggles to build your audience. Talk with other writers, meet other people who tell stories on the internet, and find out where you fit in. I found my “people” through Television Without Pity, and it opened doors that eventually resulted in me finding an agent. But my goal wasn’t to write my website full-time. It’s part of the reason I shut it down temporarily in 2001. I couldn’t afford the bandwidth fees without Chick Click’s monetary support, I didn’t want to move into a subscription model, and I was spending so many hours in a day moderating forums and updating my site I never had time to write the novels and spec scripts I wanted to write. Not because I felt one was more “legitimate” than the other. But because I’m happier writing dialogue in a script. During the time I was writing pamie.com for money, I was also a weekly columnist for the Statesman, a recapper for Television Without Pity, writing the Americanized dub scripts for an anime company, working on a book proposal and entering my screenplays and teleplays into competitions. Would you say that one of those things was more legitimate than the other? I couldn’t. But back then I needed pamie.com to pay the majority of the bills because the other stuff didn’t pay much, if at all. I was a blogger out of necessity. (Actually, I was a web diarist. We didn’t have the word “blog” yet.) If I’d bailed on any of that because I was embarrassed, I wouldn’t have been able to get to where I am. I wouldn’t have the skills I have and the experience I have. It doesn’t always come up, but sometimes my background in anime really helps in a room (especially when you’re rocking a magical vulva of opportunity).

Don’t shit on what you’re doing while you’re still trying to figure out what you want to do. Especially when you enjoy it. Because here’s the secret I wish someone had told me back when I would get apologetic for being a “web diarist” or an “online journaller” or a “crazy person who writes about herself on the internet”: when you’re really liking what you’re writing, and you’re having fun doing it? That’s probably because you’ve found your voice. You’ve found your connection with the words and the stories. There’s an audience out there hungry for someone who knows how to use her voice. Don’t stifle it because you think you’re supposed to be… what? Franzen? I don’t even know. Dooce? That blogger started just like the rest of us did a million web years ago with an internet connection and some html knowledge. But Dooce found her voice early on and she connected with people and even when it was scary and hard and people hated her, she kept going.

It’s not like The Fug Girls woke up one day and were like, “I know! Let’s make a ridiculously popular website today!” They started with a passion and it grew to something bigger than most people allow themselves to dream. Because they were brave. And they were smart. And they stuck to their voices.

Oh, my god, I just went to your about page and saw that Dooce is one of your inspirations! And that she inspired you at a conference! You’re already doing it! Why am I yelling at you? I am internet-shaking you! I’m sorry! I can’t seem to stop! I think I need to take a walk or something!

The next time you write to me, I hope it’s because you are really proud of what you are doing. And if someone made you feel like your blog wasn’t legit? I hope one day that person is on the ground with apologies. It’s your website. Everybody else can STEP OFF.

I AM ON MY BLOGGER SOAPBOX! Writers! Stop making yourselves sound like you’re not writing! It’s hard enough as it is without you shitting all over yourself! Just write, God, stop trying to find excuses not to write!

Was this answer “thoughtful and friendly” too? I feel I might have gotten a little pissy. It’s because I hate it when people apologize for doing what they love to do. Unless your thing is touching kids or puking on strangers or putting your ferret in a sweater. I have my limits.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to go back to all this “legitimate” writing, all of which will only keep happening if I keep updating this site so that people keep reading pamie.com and think, “I should buy one of her books, because this site is free and nobody buys books and Christmas is coming.”

(Yeah, I said it. I don’t have ads. I have books. And I’ll only get to keep doing that if people buy them.)

[If you have a question about writing or television or novels or screenplays or any of these places where I write words and other people read them, send an email to pamie at pamie dot com with the subject line: YOUR WEEKLY PROCRASTINATION. I will try not to yell at the next person who has a question. I WILL TRY.]

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  1. Jenny

    Thank you so much for this post. I have blogging for a long time but always felt like I wasn’t actually “writing” until one day I realized…yes, I am. Your writing blogs are so encouraging! Thank you!

  2. meadowgirl

    this post is exactly why i fucking love your ass. you’ve always tweeted me such lovely things and always answered all my mushy lovey dovey emails. and your books rock. i feel so encouraged all of the sudden.

    p.s. i love the name of this blogger’s website. i am so excited to bookmark and read. you’ve got a new fan, s.i.!!!!

  3. Brett

    I have a blog, but it’s not real writing any more than Tibetan drunken slap-fighting with my idiot friends is “Olympic-class sport.” I do it to amuse me, and if anyone driving by happens to get a chuckle or an itch to raise an eyebrow or maybe a deep and consuming need to hang the bird and scream “SHUT UP, YOU MORON!”, then We Are Pleased.

    This is not apologizing for whatever it is that I do — it’s just objective acceptance that what I do ain’t all that much.

    And “monetize”? Man, I ain’t never monetized nuthin in my entire life. I bet it requires special pants.

    Good to have you back.

    B

  4. narami

    I REALLY needed to read this. I’m a blogger, and proud!

    Thanks Pam!

  5. Julie

    You’re so right about this. I also think that there’s a related problem here, which is that many people don’t really understand the idea of writing as a career if you’re not doing it in an office Monday-Friday, 9-5. I’ve been a freelancer since 2003, making nearly the same salary that I did at my last 9-5 office job, without having to serve on any “continuous quality improvement” committees! Yet now that my youngest child has started kindergarten, I have been asked repeatedly when I am going “back to work”–by people who have been hearing about my work for the last 8 years. My conclusion is that they just don’t really get how writing can be a “real” job.

  6. Ken Shipley

    Sigh. I have about four or five blogs in different states of abandonment and I DREAM of someone happening by one of those sites, even if only to yell at me. And I’m ONLY posting this because in real life I am a Continuous Quality Improvement expert for the government.

    Sigh.

  7. Shannon

    Here’s what’s weird: I am a writer/editor for a major bank; I’m part of a team that writes and edits all the words on said bank’s ginormous website. So it literally says “Writer/Editor” on my business card, and yet? I don’t consider this “legitimate” writing. What am I writing? Instructional text for people who want to make a credit card payment? FAQs about mortgages? WHO CARES?

    I LONG for the day when I have enough time away from said “real” job to spend doing what *I* consider “legitimate” writing (can I possibly use more quotation marks? Bleh) like my blog and the series of children’s books I’ve written and am too chickenshit to submit to agencies.

    All this to say that I completely agree with you: Legitimate writing is whatever gets your true voice out there. My job pays me handsomely, but that doesn’t, to me, make it legitimate writing. It just pays the bills. And that’s really awesome, but it ain’t everything, at least not for a writer.

  8. Ken Shipley

    Heh. From the theme of our last three comments I’m compelled to share a song I learned during French Immersion in the mid-80s (“J’aurais voulu être un artiste!”). Les Blues de Businessman: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8zIPSwsE914

  9. s.i.

    I think your response was very thoughtful. And friendly…in a between-the-lines and this-is-for-your-own-good kind of way. With a helpful dose of shaking. I needed that.

    I found your website after randomly picking up Why Girls Are Wierd at Barnes and Noble, and have been a fan ever since, which must have been after the Chick Click days. I went to see you at a reading in San Francisco once. We took a picture together and you were so nice. Unfortunately, I was awkward, because I was shy and geeking out from meeting pamie.com!

    Anyway, thanks so much you for your reply. Everything you said is so right on and encouraging and the the kick in the ass I needed. Next time I write to you I will be loud and proud, and the next time I go to one of your readings, hopefully I can do more than giggle nervously.

  10. Kim

    Thanks for the inspiration and encouragement… it helped me finish an entry I’d been working on for a while now.

    You really are quite skilled at expressing thoughts with words pamie.com… have you thought about writing for a living? ;-)

  11. Beth

    Thanks Pamie and s.i.

    I love blogging and I have a lot of fear and embarrassment around it! I agree that if you enjoy it you shouldn’t be apologetic about it, so thank you for saying that.

    I’m very new to being a blogger but have been reading pamie.com since the Squishy days. The thing that keeps me blogging is that I love it and that I hope to get better and find my voice, as you say.

    You just answered a lot of my questions about blogging. I needed the encouragement!

    And this made me giggle: “Actually, I was a web diarist. We didn’t have the word “blog” yet.”

  12. Jacq

    This is great advice, Pam. My only issue with having a blog (or two) is that blogging is often far easier and more fun than other writing that I want to do, and should be doing. It can be a distraction and, for somebody as gifted in the fine art of procrastination as me, this can cause me problems.

    Mind you, the entire interweb is a distraction. I should be writing something else right now, and instead I’m reading and posting here. GAH!

  13. Helen Jane

    Thirteen years of web logging and I never made more than $3 in advertising. So there’s that.

    And relatedly, this is a gold mine of a post.

  14. dgm

    When my first child was about 11 months old and taking her first steps, my friend asked if she was walking yet. “No,” I told her, “she takes a few steps and falls down.”

    She looked me straight in the eye and said, “Dude, that’s called WALKING. What, you think she has to go into the kitchen, get you a beer and bring it back to you before you’ll say she’s walking?”

    This post reminded me of that. Thanks!

    1. pamie

      That is awesome. I’m sure I’d be the same way. “Well, she’s mostly stumbling, but I have high hopes she’ll figure it out.”

      1. pamie

        (I mean, to be honest, taking a few steps and then falling down is something I do at some point almost every month, so it’s not like I’ve mastered the whole “walking” thing, either.)

  15. Nice Jarina

    Pam, you’re still one of my favorite authors.

    I am trying not to sound all fanatic-psycho here, but thank you. I wish my blog has a new name…Its name sucks.

    But yes, thank you for this and thank you, SI for asking the question.

    I mean, we all got to start somewhere eh? :) If not, why not write just for own self! It’s such a good outlet!

  16. Kristen B

    Just wanted to say that after the plethora* of writing-related posts on your blog over the past month-ish, I was inspired to dust off a blog I’d set up on tumblr last year and promptly abandoned, because, oh, you know, the usual “I’m not a writer” and “I’m not good at this” and “this is stoopid…I’m stoopid” blah blah self-deprecation-cakes blahblah.

    I finally decided: SO WHAT!? So what if my blog is random, and disorganized, and poorly written, and has punctuation (and paragraph breaks) in all the wrong places? So what if I write 10 posts one day, and then nothing for a month? So what if nobody reads it? or everybody reads it and they hate it? I mean, who do you think you are, Pamie? the Bloggess? NO, you’re not. But that’s … OK! I’ve given myself permission to do something that others are better at and, more importantly, stop *caring* that others are better at it. (I didn’t stop taking photos with my crappy camera just because Ansel Adams existed.)

    I want … no, NEED a place I can fill with all the random crap I can’t put on Facebook because I have too many work friends and am constantly self-censoring because I’m afraid it will get back to the wrong person and I’ll be fired. I NEED a place where I can just be me and swear and drink and smoke (figuratively speaking) without worrying about whose delicate sensibilities I’m offending by not being genteel and ladylike. I NEED a place where I can just let loose and let it OUT. (“IT” being the voices in my head who are constantly reminding me that there “is no Dana, only Zuul.” Shut up, voices. I got it. Next topic.)

    I hold back all day at work. I hold back at night on Facebook. This will be my escape, my outlet, my “I AM WOMAN, HEAR ME ROAR!” bloggy blog. And fuck anyone who doesn’t like it.**

    So, from now on, whenever I comment on someone’s blog, and there is a space for a “Website”, I will proudly type my tumblr address in there. Because…well, why the hell not.

    * plethora means “three”, right?

    ** apologies for being a little rant-y and swear-y. I tend to get that way when I’m feeling “empowered.” Or, you know, “hungry.”