Some words of wisdom for any of you wishing to write a blog in Barnet. Don't. It is a real pain in the arse and will take over your life to the detriment of your social life and your family !
Sadly if like me you cannot stand to see this wonderful part of London being run into the ground, read on.
There are several styles. You can go for the factual and informative a la Mr Mustard or Mr Reasonable, You can go for passionate and partisan a la VickiM, you can go for the highly personalised a la Mrs Angry, or you can just make up your own style.
Subjects which seem to get lots of hits are things like :-
Stories about London Assembly member and Barnet Councillor Brian Coleman
Stories about hot local news
Stories about your weekend away at jacuzzi spa's with B list celebrities
Pictures of Boris Johnson looking stupid
There are several places you can find these. Most bloggers start at Council meetings, documenting how the councillors stare at the wall or pick their nose during important meetings. After a while, you may tire of this, when you twig they've done all the business before the meeting and the public bit is just for show. The real information is in the Council papers issued before meetings - here -
http://committeepapers.barnet.gov.uk/democracy/index.asp?intSubSectionID=-1&intSectionID=1 - Do councillors actually read these. Some do, but most ??? I've found many of my best stories here.
Most bloggers also put links to the other local bloggers and sites they consider worth a view. This promotes interest in shared causes and issues and helps build up other blogs profiles. It is easy to do, just use the design feature on blogger. There are all sorts of reasons people write blogs. I do it because I live here and I want it to be a better place. Some people do it because they want to launch a media career or become famous. I daresay there are people blogging because their PR guru tells them to. Whatever, the secret is to be interesting. If you write a decent blog, people will read it.
Finally, the most important bit of advice. Blog about stuff you care about. If you can prove it and think it deserves a wider audience, you can print it.
And my special tip. Pick a few fights, people love a good bust up
Sadly if like me you cannot stand to see this wonderful part of London being run into the ground, read on.
There are several styles. You can go for the factual and informative a la Mr Mustard or Mr Reasonable, You can go for passionate and partisan a la VickiM, you can go for the highly personalised a la Mrs Angry, or you can just make up your own style.
Subjects which seem to get lots of hits are things like :-
Stories about London Assembly member and Barnet Councillor Brian Coleman
Stories about hot local news
Stories about your weekend away at jacuzzi spa's with B list celebrities
Pictures of Boris Johnson looking stupid
There are several places you can find these. Most bloggers start at Council meetings, documenting how the councillors stare at the wall or pick their nose during important meetings. After a while, you may tire of this, when you twig they've done all the business before the meeting and the public bit is just for show. The real information is in the Council papers issued before meetings - here -
http://committeepapers.barnet.gov.uk/democracy/index.asp?intSubSectionID=-1&intSectionID=1 - Do councillors actually read these. Some do, but most ??? I've found many of my best stories here.
Most bloggers also put links to the other local bloggers and sites they consider worth a view. This promotes interest in shared causes and issues and helps build up other blogs profiles. It is easy to do, just use the design feature on blogger. There are all sorts of reasons people write blogs. I do it because I live here and I want it to be a better place. Some people do it because they want to launch a media career or become famous. I daresay there are people blogging because their PR guru tells them to. Whatever, the secret is to be interesting. If you write a decent blog, people will read it.
Finally, the most important bit of advice. Blog about stuff you care about. If you can prove it and think it deserves a wider audience, you can print it.
And my special tip. Pick a few fights, people love a good bust up
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