Something That Happened.

Blogger is being refreshingly creative in its presentation of the various features of its popular blog-publishing tool, inserting its Knowledge Base (tech support info.) in a series of thematic articles. Most recently, an article entitled "How to Network With Blogger" has been enlisted to demonstrate its various features, discussing classic job search strategies such as social networking by pointing out the ways you can use Blogger to meet and link with other like-minded bloggers.

This article first caught my attention because I'm preparing to look for work, and networking should certainly be near the top of the list in any decent job search strategy. I understand how vital networking can be to a career, but I've always shied away from it; networking used to seem like a dirty word to me. I could say that it's because the word includes the word "work" in it, but it's really because I used to feel that networking, in the career sense, was a superficial ritual, a way of establishing a safety net of relationships that was selfishly motivated--and I still believe it can be--but I'm growing out of that opinion, for the most part. I've come to believe that for most people, networking is simply a way of establishing a rapport with others; a way of developing a common bond with others you find interesting or drawn to. What will come out of this rapport is the safety net, of course, but one that should be viewed as mutually beneficial.

This is how networking works in theory; however, it wasn't until I began networking online that I began to experience this theory in practice.

I've discovered, through blogging and other online experiences, that I really enjoy communicating with others online. I enjoy commenting on issues, and receiving feedback; I enjoy reading other folk's commentary, and posting feedback to their websites; I enjoy participating in forums; I enjoy webcasting, both from the perspective of a broadcaster and a listener; I enjoy chatting with others; I enjoy linking to others; I enjoy being linked to; in short, I enjoy networking online. I'm interested in discovering how conscious other bloggers (or online writers and other online communicators) are of networking: Do you feel the need to communicate with other bloggers?

It's certainly a valuable aspect of this medium, enabling us to build up a social fabric of supportive (and not necessarily like-minded) individuals or groups; but to what extent are you aware of the need to build up this community? Do you make it a daily, conscious effort, or do you simply sit back and let your blog work for you, hoping to attract attention purely through the brilliance of your commentary? Do you link consistently to other bloggers, or do you link to others only when you absolutely must? Do you write articles based on blog commentary you've read elsewhere, with the intention of attracting other blogger's attention? Or do you insert links to other bloggers merely as a footnote to your commentary, without a care in your mind as to whether another blogger ever takes notice?

As inept as I am at networking in the real world, I'm fully focused on establishing an online community. First and foremost, I find it fun--it's fun to communicate with others online, whether it's through blogs, email, Instant Messaging, webcasting, gaming, chatting, or voice-over-IP. I find it thrilling to communicate with people all over the globe, discussing a world of issues that expands far beyond my local neighborhood. As far as networking's relationship to online publishing, I find that it makes the experience more meaningful. Sure, I could write commentary or fiction online without any expectation of it being read by anyone, but what's the fun in that? If that was my intention, there wouldn't be any reason for me to publish online. Blogging is fundamentally communicative, so why stop at simple (and solitary) commentary? I find it necessary to reach out to other bloggers, to see what they have to say about matters, and to engage them in the more social aspects of blogging.

So let me to engage you now. We'll begin by putting the networking theory into practice--I've installed a new commenting system to the blog (see below this post), so please use it to post feedback to this blog at any time. After you've posted your feedback, I'll post feedback on your feedback, and so on. We'll see how fun we can make this, communicating with each other, building an online community. We may not even realize were networking.