Don't be shy . . .
(Image found here)
I have just learned via my long-time bloggy friend Belle Lettre that at some recent point in the past began National De-Lurking Week. I don't know just how official this designation is--not quite as official as, say, Flag Day, I suspect. But somebody has seen fit to set aside a time to beckon in the direction of the legions of readers who visit but don't comment and say to them, Hey! You! Show yourselves, why don'tcha?
(Not coincidentally, this gives me a chance to de-lurk from my own blog, seeing as I've been too busy with Other Things to be much more than a reader myself for the past few days. So: two birds, and all that.)
Anyway. I seem to have some regular visitors who don't leave comments. I hope they'll feel welcome to do so here. And, seeing as I'm reluctant to call on people who don't want to talk, I promise I won't ask again till next year.
15 comments:
Oooh, John, I really like the way your belle-lettristic friend puts it to people.
Go snap that link, people -- especially you quiet people there in the corner. Makes sense to me.
Yeah. She has considerably more panache than I do.
Panache: very Cyrano . . .
Well I’ll delurk, I’ve added your blog to my RSS because well one I enjoy reading it but more importantly than that, though it should probably be the other way around, I am working on a thesis on the blogosphere and the literary community. Asking questions of what is the literary merit of blogs? How is creative content published here? How does the literary community act in the blog world? So naturally I found your blog in this search and well here I am commenting.
Cheers,
Huysmans
http://bloggingliterature.wordpress.com
I'm here!
I have noticed the same thing, looking at my site meter stats but this is fairly typical of any sort of online grouping. I am on several yahoo groups and other sorts of list serves and a typical group might have 500 hundred members but maybe 50 post more than a few times. Perhaps the 80 20 rule works here.
I try to make the rounds of my blog roll over a week's time but there are some blogs I comment a lot on, and others I might just say 'great post' or something inane like that.
A you I wish more people would just take a second to let me know "I am here" so that I see something else beyond a cold site meter statistic.
I am an occasional lurker... usually visiting via Pam at Tales from the Microbial Laboratory. I enjoy reading, but I generally don't feel up on my literary knowledge enough to contribute anything intelligent to the conversation. (Just in case you wonder, like I do, why some people lurk and don't comment.)
Thanks to all of you--even the non-lurkers (this means Debra, too)--for your comments.
Blackswamp girl, no worries. But, this isn't grad school here. Just jump in as the spirit moves.
ok, ok... I found you months ago through Winston's blog.
I hope to learn here and rarely have anything worthy to add in comments.
I must admit I don't frequent as much as I used to (I realized the internet was consuming too much of my time) but I will "de-lurk" after a rather long period of re-lurking.
John,
I'm with Black Swamp Girl and Jean -- some of us are a little shy in venues where we aren't experts, especially amongst such learned people. We read to learn. I'd like to suggest to whomever concocted "National De-Lurking Week" to consider the possibility that pressing people to comment and labeling them negatively might make them too uncomfortable to even "lurk." Just a thought.
Hi.
I can understand your request of introducing oneself very well. I haven't left comments here yet because I am relatively new to this place.
Although the blog that is linked to my nickname is no longer active, on the same page you can see my (main) e-mail address. This is to prove that I am not a ghost.
Jean, Andrew, and May, welcome, and thanks for saying howdy.
Jennifer, thanks for your comment. I certainly understand that people have their reasons for not wanting to leave comments on blogs, and I respect them (both those people and their reasons). I don't think of lurking (or of lurkers) in a negative way at all, and I don't know of anyone who does. I take the point of this declaration merely to be a time when those who are so inclined (I can't make 'em) to say hello and then go back to lurking. It's a sort of outing, yes--but it's a voluntary self-outing.
I assume "de-lurking" to be a similar process to "de-cloaking", a la Klingon warship style.
I too have noticed the vast difference between visitor stats and number of comments. Odd. Particularly puzzling are the bloggers whose sites I frequent and drop comments in the slot, who never return the visit. Some may even respond to my comment with a comment on their own site, or with email, but never leave comments on mine.
We are all driven by a fluid combination of time available, emotional needs, personality quirks, personal style, and maybe another trait or three. In a real world gathering of people, there will always be some who hang around the periphery, observing and listening, but refrain from mixing and mingling. Actually, that is my natural tendency in those settings, whereas, out here in cyberspace, I always jump in and dump my bucket, soiling your Comment Bin.
John, be careful what you wish for. I can be The Commenter Who Wouldn't Leave.
Wow, right, Michael -- that's great. So very true. Hey, look at the time! Damn. I have to get up early tomorrow and check my stats...
Keep on doing your good, good work.
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