From an amusing piece by Jeffrey Goldberg on advice he received on becoming a blogger:
A blogger should only post, when he has “something new to add to something old,” and has “something that no one else has.” Do not “post for the sake of posting. Resist the temptation – and boy is it a temptation – to blog because your audience expects to read something.” This last bit of advice presupposes the existence for me of an audience. On this exact point, another of our fine bloggers, Ross Douthat, offered me this piece of advice: “Don’t check your traffic.”
Regarding news reporting, Scott Karp puts it like this:
Has there ever in the history of niche media been so many news organizations writing about the same thing at the exact same time? … makes you wonder why some news orgs don’t just link to the story that’s already been published and go write about something else that nobody knows about – you know, news.
I have to agree with don’t check your traffic. It can be easy to get caught up and start blogging for others rather than yourself. I don’t hold with the “something new to add to something old,” / “something that no one else has.” idea though, because for me, my blog is a personal knowledge store first, as are my social bookmarks etc. I share both but their primary purpose is a selfish one. I’m not trying to be a Techcrunch, or Scoble or a blog thought leader.
That’s an interesting concept, Scott – the selfish blog. But, fess up, when you comment on or offer an analysis of a development, are you just chatting to yourself?
Obviously not, but the comments are still primarily to get my ideas on a topic down on paper somewhere where I can refer back to them. My ego of course hopes others will find some of what I say interesting too, and others praising the blog or a particular post do give the ego a nice boost.