Research

~ Kat Feldragonne
Image Source: www.gulf-writers.com
Image Source: http://www.gulf-writers.com

As an undergrad/grad student, I’ve done my fair share of research over the years.

However, I can’t say it’s ever been my favorite thing to do.

It’s so time consuming, for one thing.

So it takes up time I’d (of course) rather spend doing something else.

But – sometimes it’s necessary.

I’ve had to spend some time this week doing research on various things.

Numbers (and math) have never been my ‘thing.’  I’d much rather read a book than work with numbers.  😛

So cruising through stats reports is not usually high on my priority list.

I did, however, take some time to go through my stats recently to see what I could be doing better.

I love to write – it’s one of the reasons I started this blog.

I also like having people read and respond to what I write.

Otherwise it sort of feels like hollering down a black hole (I imagine, never having actually hollered down a black hole).

I am working on various ways to increase the traffic to my blog and ways to make posting to the various social networks easier and faster.

Less time spent going to different networks means I can spend more time writing. 😀

The catch-22 is that, in order to do that, I have to first spend some time researching.

Those of you who have blogs, what has worked for you?

Those of you who read the blog – are there certain topics you’d like to see covered? Covered more?  Covered less?

Any and all suggestions are appreciated!!

7 thoughts on “Research”

  1. I started blogging with a RL blog about 8 years ago, although that one has basically been on hiatus for the past two years. Everyone I met through blogging was obsessed with statistics and checked his/her blog stats religiously. Fortunately you get over that eventually although some never do.

    From day one, with over 700 posts in all, I never had a post without a comment. I was a med blog reader before I started my blog and had been commenting on various med blogs so had a small “following” right from the beginning. But I found other blogs I liked and joined a blogging group and made a niche for myself. This was how you did it in the old days. You visited the blogs of interest you saw on other people’s sidebars, added their blogs to your sidebar and commented there. A lot of it was about visiting other blogs and commenting. If you didn’t visit no one visited you. It was a tit for tat situation in a lot of cases. Of course a lot of people read blogs in “readers” and I read a lot there too and it was an extra step to go make a comment. At one point I had over 250 blogs on my feeder, which was discontinued some time ago and I never really found a new one that I liked. Luckily because that took a lot of time!

    When I started The Joy of Dance in Second Life blog last year, it was a different ballgame. Facebook had become a powerful force in advertising blog posts which I saw through the SL Art World. We used FB to keep in touch with what was going on in SL Art with exhibits and openings. My list of friends on FB covers two fields in Second Life, the Art World and the Dance Performance world. So far my name has fallen under the FB vigilantes who remove you if you don’t use your real name. But for many it hasn’t so it’s a bit tricky now keeping track of who is who, as some have returned using their RL names after being taken down by FB under their SL names. All I know is when I write a post on that blog and put it on Facebook, I get a lot of traffic for that day and the next and then it dies down again. I don’t post very often there anyway so only have a couple of followers which work differently with Blogger anyway. I was supposed to have two co-authors but that never materialized and if I have something to say, I say it and some people will see it on FB and pop over to read but otherwise it sits there.

    I know people use Twitter and Plurk very successfully. Strawberry Singh has one of the most followed SL blogs in existence today and she has written posts about using social media at various times.

    Your blog is a bit of an eclectic mix and some posts will appeal to some of your readers while others may not. I skim over the LOTD ones, just looking at the photos, since they don’t interest me so much and I find the images too small. Not sure if that is by choice or this particular WordPress template. I”m not really very familiar with WordPress having used Blogger much more.

    I don’t follow many blogs these days and don’t comment very much anymore. But I do find your blog interesting on the whole and I do feel the need to comment here now and again. 🙂

    JMB (Jo) Balogh

    1. I am trying to educate myself more about social media platforms and the best way to keep up with them.
      I knew the LOTD posts would not appeal to everyone. I do size the images down so that they load decently on the blog, but I did not realize that made them seem too small. I will have to do some experimenting and see.
      There seems to be a definite divide between those who use Blogger vs WordPress. I am more familiar with WordPress, having used it much more than Blogger. However, both have their pros and cons.
      I do need to get better about liking/commenting on other’s blogs, and that is a goal I’ve set for myself for this year! 😀

  2. I don’t usually read blogs or social media because it is too time consuming, and I really want to use my time for RL or creating dances. I do read this one because it is my ‘relaxation’ time, and I usually find things that are interesting to me. Overall, I’ve been trying to distance myself from the internet in general because I want more time in RL. With the LOTD I find clicking on the pic enlarges it. I have no interest in fashion or shopping, I’m trying to keep my SL inventory down, so I don’t do hunts either… so any topics related to these I usually skim. I’m really only interested in dance-related topics but this is your blog and you should write about what moves you.

    I am interested in discussions on some of the controversial issues in dance… the emotional ones. Of course this could lead to squabbling and that is not my goal with such topics, my goal would be to shed some understanding so that hopefully we can all live and let live, and simply enjoy the fellowship of kindred spirits. Reducing negative undertones and backbiting through shared perspectives and mutual respect for free agency would be my goal. Didn’t I word that nicely? LOL!

      1. People dancing at multiple venues, for example, which of course I do, and I have detected some resentment because of it that I simply do not understand. Why does anyone care where I dance or what I do in my SL? I don’t get how it affects them, that they apparently feel so upset by it. And people doing repeats which personally I LOVE repeats and often beg a performer to repeat a particular dance that I adored cause I want to see it again. Dance protocol and dancer responsibility is another one. Dare we touch upon lineup order, closing acts, and ego? Competitiveness? Is there such a spirit lurking in SL dance? Is there really a ‘best’ of anyone or anything? These are all provocative topics that could instigate some hair-pulling or even a war, so maybe best to let sleeping dogs lie. But, are they really sleeping? I wonder why it troubles me, and I think it is because, I detest the negative energy such brings into my orbit. Trying to avoid it has me trying to avoid people and SL in general. Cause it always seems to creep into my IM box. I love people and I don’t want to feel like this, but I am weary of the petty complaining and back-biting. Or maybe because my blood sugar is up, my tolerance is down. Insulin, you say? It’s in the mail! I am getting silly so I will shut up now.

        1. There are a lot of topics that could be considered controversial and/or cause resentment. I have touched previously on repeat performances and a few other topics that people have definite opinions on.
          Not everyone will like the same things, so of course there will be differences of opinion. The trouble is learning that there is no ‘right’ or ‘wrong’ when it comes to opinions. 😀
          As for competitiveness, of course it’s there. If it wasn’t, there would be no need to have auditions. 😛 That doesn’t make it a bad thing, however.
          Dance protocol and dancer responsibility is an interesting topic – I may explore that one. 😀
          Thanks for all the comments, and thanks for reading!!

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