dead, or remaining in secret keeping mind...

4 years after i started blogging it didn't take my surprise to see claims like this. in fact, when i logged in this place and posted the first paragraphs i felt like i was doing something retro. i couldn't help doubting why i should repeat something i already gave up one year ago IN A GEOGRAPHICAL PLACE where i could by no means be noticed as much as back in my own city. in the future, i might criticise myself for diverting some thoughts from facebook on which i could actually be seen.

but it's more complicated than merely sharing thoughts and getting involved in social networks. meanwhile it's simpler than sharing. as i cannot convey my ideas precisely by handwriting anymore, various internet platforms have long been my draft papers. i own my bulletin board--which is chinese-based--and i post roughly-composed notes on facebook. it's simpler than sharing because what i ultimately need is a public space of storage and neither of the abovementioned media looks lovely. they're plain, wordpad-like and without webpage fun.

it's complicated at the same time. we know that you can import your blog into facebook notes. such an option might suggest a higher social function possessed by facebook than by blogs, especially blogs of people with no fame and no influential ideas, who just want their threads to be read and get some feedback. in this sense the 'changing nature' of blogging counts for the corner that 'non-influential' people encounter. ostensibly, blogging is still something distributed and de-centralised, but--i know nothing about how it goes in the western--in my countries, audience are being drawn to the recommended blogs highlighted on the home pages of blog services. for example, who would ever want to read a college student complaining his school demolishing a memorable building at the campus? maybe his classmates would, whilst none of the decision-makers would ever know that there have been some insightful critics posted in a personal journal. on the other hand, those recommended blogs might be more like personal logs than vehicles for public debates. i have read a range of 'recommended' ones that are vehicles for private affairs and emotional expressions of some famous free-lancers and writers. the only thing to be recommended seems to be a chance of peeking. which is not, by the way, since the authors get to manipulate what to conceal and what to publish.

then it's thinkable that bloggers without influence sought to share their concerns via a more distributed platform. within a space built to be a social network, such as facebook, you're no longer an island. you've been exposing yourself to a semi-exclusive group--if you're very, very careful about what to be published--and it might not hurt to share more.

to me, this is the complicated part. when i doubt myself for being too shy to share everything on facebook, i wonder how badly i want to invite comments on my pre-mature thoughts and posts. i do, really, but when it comes to the dilemma between totally open and completely secret, i need something buffering in between. in this buffering space there's no information about my school, my employer and my social circles. i write stuff as simultaneously an anonymous author and a (potential) friend of visitors. to put things on facebook implies that i'm actually hoping to catch my friends' eyes, whilst the posts here don't necessarily bear such social needs and functions.