(no subject)

[zuki_san]

So recently I've been doing a bit more here and there on various pagan communities or journals here on LJ. I've friended several rather interesting folks, and been friended in turn. I always feel a little bit sheepish about that second part, because I provide essentially no content on my actual Livejournal. I post about once a season when I'm in a particularly good mood, often about a month or two weeks after whatever event it was put me in a particularly good mood.

I think part of the reason I feel reticent about posting is that I'm not quite sure if the groups of people that originally friended me (acquaintances from real-life, webcomics, anime fandom, etc) are all that interested in what I might be babbling about on my LJ now (being a treasurer for the Pagan Student Union at my college, trying to be a totemist and an animist, recording meditations or dreams. Possibly relationship stuff, college stuff, and in the future, job-hunt stuff.)

One solution that I've seen other people take would be to set up a collection of filters for people to opt in to, but I'm not sure I post often enough for that to be an issue just the same. I'm pretty sure I've got an open-minded enough set of LJ-Friends that it doesn't really matter what I end up posting about, but I don't really now for certain.

What do you all think? Can anyone imagine any topic I might end up discussing that they'd rather not be reading? Should I just learn to use cuts and tags and filters?

Or should I just hang all that and post more often, dangit?

If you don't pipe up I'll probably assume you don't have an opinion, or don't really read the rare things that I have to say in here.

Comments

Hmm...

[ysabetwordsmith.livejournal.com]

>>I think part of the reason I feel reticent about posting is that I'm not quite sure if the groups of people that originally friended me (acquaintances from real-life, webcomics, anime fandom, etc) are all that interested in what I might be babbling about on my LJ now (being a treasurer for the Pagan Student Union at my college, trying to be a totemist and an animist, recording meditations or dreams. Possibly relationship stuff, college stuff, and in the future, job-hunt stuff.)<<

In my experience, pretty much all human interests are represented on LJ sooner or later. If your topic field shifts, you may find some people leaving and some people entering your audience because of that; but you'll probably still have an audience as long as you post. The Pagan student activity is a matter of high interest for many people, though.

You probably don't need filters. Filters are best used for high-traffic blogs with several sub-audiences, or for material that you know some of your viewers don't want to see (like photographers who do nature scenes and nudes), or for things intended only for a certain sub-audience.

If you post about something that doesn't interest me, I'll just skip it; no harm done.

Learning to use tags is very useful, because it lets people find their interests quicker. Start by making a list of 10 or so things you like to talk about (Paganism, college life, personal, etc.) and use those as tags; you'll discover more later.

Learning to use cuts is vital if you make any long posts, including large or multiple images. I recommend the LJ client program Semagic, which makes cuts and other things very easy.

Above all, do post more often! People forget about you if you're silent. The minimum effective activity is about once a week. At least make sure you're posting once a month; you're more likely to succeed with small increases in frequency than big ones.

To post more often:

* Use LJ's "writer's block" function which gives you a topic every day. Some of them are silly, others are darn good.

* Make a list of questions you periodically answer, or other things you can report on regularly; frex, how classes are going or what the weather is in your area. If your Pagan club doesn't mind, post a summary of each meeting's activity. For totemism, discuss one animal at a time going through a list.

* Read your Friends page until you find an interesting public post. Comment there, and link to it from your blog. Networking boosts your traffic.

* Subscribe to several newsfeeds on topics that interest you. Copy the first paragraph or two of an article in your blog and link to the rest of the article. Add a few lines sharing what you think about that topic.