Hard Times for Bloggers

If you get an outfit, you can be a blogger, too!


Plaintalker began in June 2005 and Dan launched his blog in November 2005. We have both posted just about daily since then, and readers say they have come to depend on the blogs for news of Plainfield.

Well, both of us have our three-score and ten in the rear-view mirror. Nonetheless, we have been able to get around to public meetings and look under rocks for news and gossip - until now. Dan has been temporarily sidelined for health reasons and I have been struggling with unprecedented aches and pains that are getting in my way as a blogger. Maria  and Dr. Yood have been carrying the hyperlocal banner while most of the other bloggers on Dan's list have dropped back to occasional posts, if any.

We are all wishing Dan a speedy recovery, but if he needs time to regroup, we will just have to realize that blogs are no more monolithic than any other communication medium. Nearly all here in Plainfield are solo operations. And blogs in general may be going the way of the dodo bird in the face of chirpy blue-bird innovations.

At the library Tuesday I saw a Black History Month display featuring copies of The Voice,  a significant publication for its time. I once read through the library's archive of  The Voice in order to better understand the era of political and demographic change it documents. The weekly where I first started writing about Plainfield, called "Plainfield Today," is also on file in the archive. Like many print operations including the alternative newspapers of the 1970s, the weekly came and went. Currently, changing times are decimating the so-called "legacy media" of daily newspapers.

By contrast, in Jim Romenesko's column tonight I learned about a news outlet that was created to be read only on a tablet, that new electronic darling seen in the arms of early adopters.

So maybe in "blog years," the span from 2005 to present is a pretty good run. If  things slow down or stop, there will still be a valuable archive of news and gossip about Plainfield into which future historians can delve. If the fates allow, maybe the septuagenarian set of bloggers can eke out a couple more years. At 90 years plus, Dr. Yood is our paragon.

Have patience, dear readers, and send Dan your best wishes and prayers as he recovers. He may be wishing he had a magic wand instead of a pointy stick, but healing can't be hurried. All best from Plaintalker, too, Dan.

--Bernice