Kenyan Blogger, Which One Are You?

Since I started blogging , I have seen many types of bloggers around. They are all over and others are just bloggers by mouth. With the entry of micro-blogging site like Twitter, there is even a dispute of what the definition of a blogger is. In Kenya, we have those who blog for money, attention, just for fun, gauge opinions, vent, please masters and those who are just torn between all of them.

To me, we have these types of bloggers;

1. The Strongly Opinionated – They dont care what others think of their blogging stype. They will tell it to you straight to your face and not care whether you will like it or not. They are the ones who most dont want to meet or engage with because of their bulldozer-like opinions.

2. The Damn Funny Bloggers – You would read their blogs and shed tears of laughter all through. They are not many but when you get them, everybody loves them. They would look at everything through a different perspective which might sometimes come as immature especially if it is a serious matter. They always deliver the delight.

3. Low Lying, Popular, Humble and very Diplomatic – They sometimes become popular with everyone because they will never engage in online fights with anyone. They will not reply to controversies and will walk out on any strong discussion. But when they put their words down, you will get diplomacy and very humble opinions.

4. Money Minded – Everything they write will start and end with how to make money. You don’t want to spoil their chances of making money. They will always want to tell you how to make millions while mostly they are paupers. They will follow 20,000 on twitter and maybe have only 10,000 following them back. They can sometimes be not so pleasing.

5. The back-n-forth conversationalists– They get more attention than most bloggers. They will be on almost every thread and discussion and sometimes can poke their nose all over. People who get very bored and fear strong opinions will never like them because their opinion will be blunt, straight and boring to those who want to be blind to facts.

6. The Artful, Perfect Blogger – They will take their time writing a post and when it comes out, it will be a masterpiece. They are as rare as those gemstones.

7. The Copy Bloggers – They will infringe on every copyright. They don’t have much originality and would get into trouble now and then.

8. Lazy Dogs – They wrote their last blog post 6 months ago. They get into problems mostly with those doing regular posts. They will complain if they feel that their masters, mostly corporates and those who give them freebies, are attacked.

I blog for fun and love it so much. I say whatever I want without pleasing anyone. My objective will never be to please anyone. I will never write anything to gain favours. The last thing anyone would ever take away from me is my independent mind. I have learned painfully that to gain respect, everybody must not agree with you. We will have very immature feelings if we think that everybody should love Colgate because you use it. Why castigate those who see Sensodyne as a better toothpaste?

Another aspect of my social media engagement is to call it as I see it. If you do something stupid, I will say so. We cannot coat words and sweeten them for ears. I am blunt and that might make some very very uneasy and cause them to have midnight blogging sessions and indirect attacks on myself.

What I have found out is that we can never all be the same. You are a blogger, don’t attack someone else’s blogging style. Use their weakness to better your blogging. Midnight rants about someone else’s blogging style wont build you. And if you suck up to brands, do it without thinking that everyone who doesn’t agree with the brand is a hater.

My dad used to have a very simple advice. We are 25 kids and so he told us each has his or her own way of approaching him for favours. There are kids who come crying, some come shouting, some come sit down and engage him and some just wont say a thing. But what he made sure we understood was that we are all his kids. We can’t all behave like Legio Maria. Some will be catholics, Protestants, Anglicans and some just atheists. Respect to all is paramount.