Sunday Blog Reflections

After a stint of chores this morning and a quiet house, I decided to take a look at the new genealogy blogs that Geneablogger listed on Saturday. There are a few that caught my eye and are off to a good start. I should say here that I have not blogged for very long and am by no means an expert on what makes a good blog. In fact I'm still trying to figure out the gadgets for mine.

What surprised me were the number of bloggers who did not include a name for themselves or some sort of photo/picture. I understand the desire to protect one's identity, but for goodness sake throw me a bone! Go by a first name and put a picture of your great aunt. In general genealogists are pretty nice people and friendly. Part of relating to people is giving them a name to go by and not just a blog name. Dear Myrtle's blog has done this very nicely. She goes by Myrtle or Ole Myrt and has a lovely drawing of a woman as her id photo. This is not her real name but it works. I am able to relate to her and have a sense of who she is.

I was also surprised by the lack of joining/following options. Some of the blogs only offered one way to follow them as a RSS feed. Everybody has a preferred way to follow the blogs they subscribe to. I think if you only offer one or two ways you limit your readership. Case in point, there was a blog I thought would be interesting to follow. However, there was only one option given to follow, that I don't use, so I didn't sign up. Life is busy, I can only remember to keep track of so many sites on a daily basis.

If you are looking for advice or help on genealogy blogging Amy Coffin of The We Tree Genealogy Blog has just written and released The Big Genealogy Blog Book. Amy has been blogging for a long time and has written about blogging in her blog many times. It is on my list of reads.

*Amy has not asked me to review her book nor do I get any compensation for the mention. I just thought it noteworthy and useful.