Why are there so many Go journals and blogs?

[Ahwahnee]

Is there something about Go and keeping a journal? I seem to come across a lot of blogs and journals.

[Chew Terr]

First, it's a huge... journey, so people like to track and talk to people about their progress.

Secondly, it's a game with a disproportionately highly technical fanbase. There will be a disproportionate number of blogs since such a high percentage of the players have weblogs and such. Which is related to why there are a relatively large number of small and useful computer-based tools.

Third, reading other people's journals tempts people to make their own.

I've noticed this, but I actually think it's pretty cool. I think the first go blog I read was ChiyoDad's, and I've been enjoying looking at others since.

[Kirby]

Personally, I have a hard time keeping a blog. I have tried a few times to do so, but I can never think of what to write about. I always feel like I am talking to a brick wall.

The exception to this is that I used to use Lang-8 for awhile to make posts about what I did each day, but this was to study language more than anything else.

[Li Kao]

At least the journals on L19 are a lot about motivating yourself to put time into studying.

[Bantari]

I am not sure I get the journals very much.
But if they help people learn and increase their appreciation of the game...

The one comment I have is that it seems to me that a forum is a very awkward medium for such stuff. A blogging framework would be much better, for the readers and for the owners. This awkwardness is why I try to avoid reading the journals, even though I think there is a lot of interesting stuff there...

I'm not very familiar with phpBB, but is there a blog plugin?
Might be worth upgrading if the journals are more than just a passing fad...

Just checked. There seem to be solutions out there...
http://www.phpbb.com/search/?q=blog

[Chew Terr]

Out of curiousity, Bantari, what features could blog-specific sites offer that L19 doesn't? It seemed convenient to me, since it already offers diagrams, sgf tools, and an audience of go enthusiasts.

[Bantari]

Out of curiousity, Bantari, what features could blog-specific sites offer that L19 doesn't? It seemed convenient to me, since it already offers diagrams, sgf tools, and an audience of go enthusiasts.

It has all the features, but it handles them awkwardly for this purpose.

In particular, the owner's posts and all the comments of others are intermixed, treated at the same level. I think it would greatly improve the usability/readability if it was structured as a blog - with the owner's posts visible and the comments rolling out on demand. There are some other blog-specific things (specific about page, specific links page, etc) which i think would add to the experience, but the one I mentioned is the biggie for me.

[Marcus]

I would use a blog, but I don't have the time to figure out how to embed diagrams and sgf files as seamlessly as the forum does. I'm sure it's fairly easy, but it's already been done for me here.

I do agree that the advantage of a blog is that comments can be made on specific posts instead of simply adding to the one common thread.

[kokomi]

I like to post here, it feels good to see others posting as well.

[GoCat]

People like to think that they and their achievements matter...

Excellent observation. And knowing that, for the most part, my achievements (esp. in Go) don't matter, I find it much easier not to worry about rank and advancing, but rather to enjoy the game.

[keithlard]

My achievements don't matter, but I like keeping a blog nonetheless (and I use Drupal for the blog software and Eidogo for embedding games).

I am not in a club, and don't have many Go-playing friends, so it is nice to have somewhere to record my thoughts and ideas about the game, and it will be interesting to go through the old entries in years to come!

Most problems and frustrations that we encounter in learning Go have probably happened to someone else as well - so it can be encouraging to read about other people's experiences.

Shimari - my Go diary

[CarlJung]

I must be feeling especially old and grumpy today, but I can't be alone in thinking that there are too many journals. The bulk of the posts are something like "today I did 15 tsumego" or "today I played a serious game and got crushed". Who cares? They don't contribute anything. I can understand from a personal perspective that one might want to keep a personal log. But why not make it personal, you know, in a word document or something? There might occationally be some good information for a spectator in there but it's being drowned in the mundane stuff. If one has truly found something of value and want to write about it, why not start a thread in one of the regular subforums?

To preempt the "if you don't like it, don't read it" argument, like most people I read the forum from the "View new posts" button and the signal to noise ratio is getting worse. With new members arriving at a steady pace and thinking it's a great idea to start a journal with more of the same "oh look, I did 15 tsumego" it will only go downhill.

I realize some people is going to feel hurt here. It was fun in the beginning to follow SoDesuNe's tsumego marathon but it gets old real fast when everybody just writes more of the same. Often there isn't even anything to discuss! Just the regular tsumego reporting. What kind of discussion board is that? Besides, it seems most journals start stating bold plans and just stops a few days later. Who needs that? What does it contribute?

Remove the study journals subforum!

[GoCat]

I must be feeling especially old and grumpy today, but I can't be alone in thinking that there are too many journals....

Remove the study journals subforum!

No, you're not alone. And I'm even feeling quite chipper today! These are like personal blogs, and we all know how tedious those can get! I'm always amazed at what people write in their blogs -- do they think it's of general interest? These study journals are like that.

However, I'm not ready to go as far as suggesting the study journals should be removed. People who write these things (or personal blogs) also enjoy reading them. That's my guess about blogs: personal blogs are generally read by other personal bloggers. So too with the journals, perhaps.

But this does make me think of a cool feature for the forum... (I should put this in the suggestions category, so go read my idea there!)

[Bantari]

I must be feeling especially old and grumpy today, but I can't be alone in thinking that there are too many journals.

You're not alone...
I was trying to be more diplomatic, for once, but this was my other reason for suggesting a blog format/addon instead of a forum.
There is Go content in the journals, but just not that much and not for everybody. Not for me, I guess...

PS.
Been to rgg recently... people complain it is flooded with spam, with hardly any relevant Go content. L19 cannot be doing too bad in this respect if we feel like complaining about too much Go-centric posts... things are looking good, I'd say...

[karaklis]

Well, I enjoy reading the journals. It just takes a few minutes to do this. I have an own "journal" (not on L19), but writing on it at a much slower pace, i.e. about once a month, so I don't waste too much time with it (also because I don't have a lot of go activities running right now). For me it is interesting to see which approach people have for their improvement, and which effect their approach actually has. Do you really improve? Do you get bored soon? Do you get burnt out? These are interesting questions for me and the answer that I hope to get makes me read the journals every morning.