A Secret to My Posting Style
I’m busy, and I wouldn’t claim I’m able to post on a very frequent basis, and always promised everyone I will be “coming and going like the wind”, due to my uncertainty of being able to keep up, but I’m still able to do so nonetheless. My guess is that it’s probably due to some of my blogging habits and schedule – which had already formed an unique blogging style of it’s own.
My blogging style makes good use of technological and internet improvements. First-off, a quick run down of all the relevant portable devices I owned – I have a smartphone: Galaxy Note, and a W8 tablet: Dell Latitude 10. What do I do with all these portable devices?
I blog on the go.
The android wordpress app is incredibly useful, the only downside to it is that if you forgot to set your posts to “draft”, which is can be very easily missed due to the design, you will be posting your unfinished drafts out of nowhere – I literally made some mistakes like that. As I don’t have an apple device with me, I don’t really know how apple’s wordpress app works so I can’t make any comparisons here. Windows RT’s wordpress app is horrible though, you can’t post/edit anything, you can only view your written posts. Fortunately I can use the all familiar desktop-interface for my Dell Latitude 10 so I don’t have to rely on RT fully.
Now, more than half of my posts were written on the go – my android wordpress app is used quite heavily. Whenever an idea sprung into my mind out of nowhere, I just pop up the app on my phone and write the title of my idea and if I can spare some time, I jot down a few key points. I then try to manifest and join these fragmented ideas into a coherent article; also may done on the go, but I still use my home desktop for this.
Once, I’m done writing the posts on the go, I may make some final edits on my article there and then, or I can just wait until I get back. When I’m back, I will also usually do the finishing touches on my desktop computer – formatting, finding the right pictures, editing them and uploading them. It’s something I think my phone can manage, but it’s just too inconvenient a task to be done on the phone.
![[AnimeUltima] Papa no Iukoto wo Kikinasai! - 1 [720p].mkv_snapshot_11.12_[2012.02.12_05.58.23]](https://deluscar.files.wordpress.com/2014/02/animeultima-papa-no-iukoto-wo-kikinasai-1-720p-mkv_snapshot_11-12_2012-02-12_05-58-23.jpg)
Through this method, I made a number of “spare posts” – completed posts with formatting and pictures done, but only sitting in the drafts section at the moment. I kept them as spare for a number of reasons – first off, it’s to post them only when I know I will be too busy to even touch my computer, or my phone, so that these emergency spare posts will help liven up the blog during it’s inactive moments. Some consideration are taken into account into what I think are good spares, for example, discussion on topics that will stay strong for a long time is a good spare. Commentaries/editorials on current anime are something I won’t be keeping as spares, and will prioritize posting them up the first chance I get.
Second reason why I keep spares, is a bit of an odd one – it doesn’t fit with the sequence of posts I had in mind. For example, posting reviews back-to-back isn’t something I like doing, and tried to avoid it if it is possible. As my blog is the cross-blog type, I like each of my post to have a bit of variety, so I can go to my spares if one of my posts there fit with the sequence of my other posts.
Which brings us to the next point – the content I wrote in my spares doesn’t always fit the sequence I wanted 100%. If you had seen some of my update and announcement posts, I think I mentioned a number of times that I won’t be gone completely (not to the point of hiatus), but my posting rate will be very unstable. Part of the reason is that if none of my spare posts match the sequence I had in my mind, then I might be compelled to post something completely new, which will make my posting rate suffers.
Another thing here of note is that a lot of my ideas are connected to one another. If I finished a post, I may find that writing the other related post as a sort of prerequisite will help redefine and reinforce the idea I had in my current post. So I ended up storing this post as a spare and work on my other related post. This is another relevant factor to the sequence of posts which will effect my posting rate as well.
And thus, this is the secret to my posting style, a style making good use of portable gadgets, and a style which would help me even in the more busier moments.
What’s your posting style?
P.S: Indeed, this whole post was written on the go with my phone as well, aside from the pictures.
deluscar 
I just whatever comes to mind. I monologue it to myself and…if my body feels up to it, I can hopefully type what I want to say before I forget. Sometimes I don’t make it on time and the ideas fly away.
Well, that works, lol. I have tons of ideas too, and by luck, I could remember them at a later date at times, but most of the time, I just entered them as a title in my WP app at the very least, just to be safe.
I’ve been doing the same kind of mobile blogging over the past few months as my life gets easier. The Blogger app on iOS is a bit unwieldy and thw WordPress app crashes a lot on my iPad, so I use Blogsy instead. I also edit pictures for my figure reviews on my mobile devices, but when it comes to the html formatting that I like to do and actually setting up the pictures, I go back to my laptop. Despite my best intentions, I never have any “spares” though. ^_^;
Blogsy, never heard of it, but would like to try it if it’s available on android, though unlikely, I think, lol. My WP android app’s pretty handy to jot down ideas I thought up of on the fly, but as for heavy editing which require pictures and formatting and whatnot, it’s not as good. Especially so for uploading pictures, I think you can only upload thumbnail sizes. Sometimes I had “spares” because I’m just that fussy, even at myself xD Shouldn’t be that much of a problem even if you don’t have any^^
There are a couple of times that I wrote full posts on mobile devices. I wrote a few posts with Pages on the iPad back in 2010 and then do the proofreading. I also made at least one post on the Surface Pro 2 in Word with only the on-screen keyboard, but generally, I don’t use mobile devices to make posts as a touchscreen keyboard are not that great to make long posts. But generally I use my laptop since I will be using it for most of the day.
But aside from that, I usually make posts on the whim and I don’t make drafts…
iPad seems like it’s a good device for blogging, lol, I don’t know. With such a huge choice of apps, I think there should be a number of good blogging apps one way or the other. My android phone’s good enough, but doing pictures on it is tough, and my W8’s WP app is pretty bad. I can understand the difficulty of using a touchscreen keyboard. Fortunately enough, my posts aren’t really long either, I can finish up most of my shorter posts with a phone just fine. Although if you’re using a tablet, you can always get a bluetooth keyboard or something…
Actually, I have an Apple Bluetooth keyboard which I bought a few years, which of course can turn a tablet into a mini computer. Of course I can always buy a type cover to turn it into a ultrabook, but I generally prefer a larger laptop so I can have other windows up while writing a post if I need to refer to something.
But at the end of the day, a tablet won’t replace a computer, especially for blogging. To me, tablets are better for media consumption, ebooks, drawing/artwork, and notetaking.
Well, I can understand that, lol. Speaking of opening multiple windows up, I had been thinking of buying a portable monitor. You know how my desktop setup uses 2 monitors right? Great for opening multiple windows. It’s kinda annoying when it’s just one screen though, especially when I’m on-the-go with my portable devices, so that portable monitor looks tempting (it can be powered using just an USB port).
For my review posts, which is the majority of my blog content, I’m kinda old-fashioned and write them up in my “draft book”, on paper, before typing them up on the computer. The words seem to come easier when I’m sitting at a desk with a pen in hand. Also, I think I can write a lot faster than I can type (although it’s reaaaaally messy) :-P . Then I do draft editing and final posting on the computer. I’ve got the WP iPad app, but I find it a bit annoying and don’t use it to write posts. I kinda “blog on the go” as well, but not using technology haha. For my editorial/other posts, I usually scribble down some dot points by hand, but type the whole thing up on the computer. So yeah, I don’t like tablets much when it comes to blogging.
Ahh, you’re writing them down on paper… old man xD jk.
I know can think better when actually writing down on paper, I tried it myself though, and it’s just so messy, lol. Unlike on the computer, when I can just erase or move around the words, on paper, I made lots of corrections – strikethroughs to cancel some lines, arrows to indicate that I’m moving around some words; looking at my written notes just confuse the hell out of me even more, lol xD
The general messiness is definitely a downside… my main problem is that I have trouble figuring out what I actually wrote :-(
That’s why tablet is the love for me.
At the moment i’m mainly posting reviews because they’re a lot easier for me to write…and I review pretty much everything I watch/play/read so I never run out of material. All of my writing is done on my laptop at home though…despite considering myself technologically literate i’ve never really trusted smartphones or tablets XD That and I don’t want to spend the money to get really good ones. And even if I did have them…i’m usually busy when i’m out, so I wouldn’t have the time anyway.
As i’ve said, I just write reviews as I finish things. Because of the backlog of posts I generated while deciding whether I actually wanted to blog or not (a period you’ll know all about =P), nearly everything I post is about 3 months old. While I enjoy having such a large buffer it also means that responding to comments can be quite difficult because I don’t remember the show all that well.
I choose what I want to review, lol. I think I’m going to burn out if I were to review everything that I had watched/read/played. I can understand that. Portable devices like those can ironically, never beat the power of a full powerhouse computer/laptop xD Their apps, most of their capabilities can be reproduced in the computer, perhaps even with more features. I usually just use it to jot down some quick ideas I thought of on the fly since I don’t want to forget them later. If I have time, I try to think of the idea some more, but if I don’t, I just leave it for later.
Speaking of which, I have a feeling you will have much more “spares” than I ever have >_>
Well, I -was- writing them for a good 3 months XD
I usually only post some sort of reviews of VN i played in my blog. I only have laptop to post them which also where I played them. My style is to type them down in Notepad as I played and screenshots with sniptool. I don’t have any specific idea or pattern, I just type them out. For me, I just want to share instead of actually critic. As a result, there are various way of writing in the same blog even though the posts are actually about same VN but for different routes.
That’s definitely a way, although I prefer to type them until after I finished it, or finish until the latest part available.
Ahh, sniptool. Now that when you mention it, it’s about time I find some screenshot softwares, lol. I took VN screenshots by using the old-fashioned print screen… xD Kinda annoying too since I had to crop it, and also the fact that my resolution is so huge (x2 monitors)
Good post :)
You seem to do things in a similar way to myself :)
My smart phone does my head in when I try and type on it, but like yourself I try and write things on the go (Nexus 7 Tab) and usually finish up things on the computer (which is currently boxed up, hate moving).So at present I’m doing bits in work (break, lunch, quite time but dont tell the bosses :P) and on a crappy laptop that runs out of memory when I try to crop images :S
I like the reserve post idea :)
I also jot ideas down as I get them and try to keep a list of ideas for posts using trello.com :D
I use it at work for projects and found it good for sorting ideas, moving them to a label “working on” and finally over to “done” when finished :D There is also an app so it maybe of use to you :)
Anyway, back to work…
L8erz Mouse
I never said when specifically I’m doing my on-the-go blogging in my post but my schedule is pretty similar to yours indeed. Especially if I plan to attempt to form these ideas into a post, I tend to write either during lunch time (which can get as lengthy as 1 to 2 hours) or “downtime” during work too xD Although recently I’m using more of these downtime to watch some random non-anime shows. I really prefer to do image editing on my main desktop, lol. If I really had to use portable devices for image editing, like say cropping image like you said, I just use an online image editor. Much more simple… xD
Never heard of trello, but just listing down ideas on WP is sufficient for me for now :p I’ll check it out though, think it’s available on android.
Yea, yea, stop slacking, man. *says the person who listen to Stone Cold Steve Austin’s theme song at work*
Well a vast majority of my posts tend to be reviews, so while I have no shortage of content available to write about, there is a huge shortage of time and I tend to write a decent amount with my reviews so I don’t have as much time to write as I’d like. I don’t have a smartphone so even if my posts were a lot more manageable as far as content, it probably wouldn’t be the best idea for me to write them on the go, especially since I’m a very fast typer but very slow with texting or touch screen phones. As such, I’ve gotten very behind on the blogging (and it’s been over a month since I last posted, much to my dismay) and I’m hoping that I can at least make a few posts during my spring break now before I’m stuck back in school for another 2 months, when I’m almost sure I won’t have the time to post much of anything. Worst case scenario, summer should be a time of great freedom for me, but it’s far too early to dwell on that.
At the moment I have a list of the series I’ve completed at the ready so I know what to blog about next (and as it stands, that list is quite large since there are still things from even December I have yet to write about), though there are a few things I’m willing to post about regardless of that set schedule since it’d be much more appropriate to do so given the time. For example, if I’m keeping up with a number of ongoings from that season and get to the halfway and endpoints of the season, chances are I’ll post as soon as possible regardless of how much other stuff I have to write. This is also true of my posts about conventions or other such events, as it would be quite detrimental to my post to try writing details about what took place when it’s been a good 3 months since it happened.
I also happen to have a system for how I go about handling my blogging and all (more obsessiveness from me, as always). Since I’ve gotten very behind on MAL conversations, replies on my blog, and other posts from the blogs I follow, I’ve made it a bit of a policy to make sure that I’ve at least gotten to everything up to one month prior to the current date before I decide to make a blog post. That way I’m not TOO behind (though I still feel very, very behind) on all the things I want to be and at the same time it’s not completely impossible to keep up with my blogging, even if it’s atrociously slow. Because of this, I have a huge (and very intimidating) bunch of tabs with everything and everyone I want to get to in chronological order (I’m not sure if anyone would possibly be as obsessive as me about this). If I’m on a better schedule I’m willing to get to ALL of those comments and replies before I make a blog post, but given my lack of time and huge list of things to write about, it seems that won’t be the case until summer at the very least.
I actually have too much contents to write myself too, lol. A lot of times, I think of ideas on the fly, and just listed it on my WP, but in the end, not even half of those ideas were expanded into actual content, so my WP dashboard ended up having a sea of drafts (and spams, but that’s a discussion for another time). The touch-screen interface does need some getting used to, but it’s really useful once you got the hang of it. The only thing I hate about it is that it’s an Android phone (and android phone eats batteries like there’s no tomorrow), I would buy an iphone, but I just don’t wanna fork over such unneeded luxury purchases atm, lol.
From each anime seasons, I actually just chose which anime I want to write about, be it a review or commentary or anything, so at least I won’t be that hectic. Also, even if watch like 10 anime in a season, I may write as less as 2 anime, lol. There’s also the fact that I emphasize variety on my blog, so once I’m done with my anime commentaries/reviews of every season, I immediately jumped back to my usual posts. Indeed, it’s good to know which post of yours have a more “long-term” effect and which have a “short-term” effect. I do think posts about ongoing anime (or ones that just finished) should be prioritized on, hence my aforementioned anime commentaries/reviews of each season. I don’t join a lot of conventions or events though so don’t know about that, although I compiled all the local events I entered in a post before, one of them dating as far back as a year ago, lol.
I’m similar in a way actually, but not to your level xD As for me, I don’t really care about the order. If I posted something, then I can just go about replying my previous comments I haven’t replied, and checking any new posts of the blogs I’m following, or vice versa or anything. Like I said, the order isn’t really important for me. In fact, I’m replying to you know just when I had posted something new on my blog, lol. I just like doing as much of my blogging stuffs in one shot like that, feels more productive than to do them sporadically.
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