My Blog Manifesto-Part I

“Be yourself, everyone else is taken.” Oscar Wilde

Ugh, I guess with these words I’m now officially a blogger. I cringe at the term in all of its forms; blog; blogger; blogosphere…actually blogosphere is pretty cool but the others…

I think most bloggers would more appropriately be called Web Diarists, since that’s what so much of blogging (ugh!) has become. Online regurgitations of what someone ate today and how they felt; only pertinent for a short time and perhaps never of interest to anyone but the writer or their close friends; their very close friends.

I much prefer the term Web Essayist. Although certainly no more worthy than the aspirations of the rest of the blogosphere rabble, I will aspire to a goal of writing web essays or columns that at least appear to mimic writing which is commercially viable and built around a consistently fair and unique viewpoint that may spur thought or understanding in someone else.

I guess that is the beginning point of my Manifesto and how I determined the content I would strive for and the format of my essays. First, on one random day I cut, pasted and did word counts on a wide range of opinion page editorialist and Houston Chronicle columnist articles and somewhere between 700 and 750 words looks like what the assignment editor is typically looking for in a column.

George Will, bless his precise heart, had the two columns I checked come in at 749 each. In some cases I would gladly read longer articles from certain writers. On the other hand 750 words are about the maximum you want to hear from E. J. Dionne Jr., et al.

I checked the last column of the late William F. Buckley and it was a tight 640 words. Upon his death, the writer in me was impressed and inspired by the stories of his ability to write salient columns to meet the next days deadline in an hour’s time and for having a knack, if you will, for writing that I can appreciate.

Until now, it’s admittedly a trait I have only been able to exercise and hone through well-written sales letters, training manuals, marketing plans, customer service responses and the occasional inspired response to a “Dear John” letter or conversation. So, 750 will be my target word-count and I hope to post, nee publish, two or three columns a week. Initially, Tuesdays and Fridays with maybe a Weekend Special in there or something snazzy like that.

Also, as of July first I have decided to go without television for a year partly as a way to create time to write (TV is such a drug and time-waster for me) and partly with the idea of giving me an experiment to write about at some time in the future when I’m struggling for a column idea. See, I’m already shilling to the blogopsyche.

I am also operating on the typical assumption that we might be on opposite ends of the spectrum on any number of issues where I’m not going to change your mind and you’re not going to change my mind. So I’m going to try and write about stuff I think everyone can probably agree on or at least relate to in some way. The sqiushy grey stuff in the middle that gives us all fits, if you will.

I welcome your comments and will dutifully read them but my fragile ego would much rather see a bunch of Atta Boy’s and agreement rather than hear from people who think I want to have some tiring back and forth debate with you about my essay or viewpoint.

Finally, all of these essays, including this Manifesto, will eventually be available on my site, www.gregeast.com; remember our motto, “I’m not on MySpace. I own my space.”

Next Up: My Blog Manifesto, Part II (What makes me an expert on anything?)