One of the most interesting blogging-related queries you can do on Google, Why I blog gives a great deal of insight into both our online culture and the nature of our individual needs for self-expression.

I've been questioning my own blogging needs a great deal lately, as a result of having not blogged very much in the last few months. It's not the other way around, deliberately weaning myself off the blog or anything; rather it's that many of the outlets satisfied by blogging over the last five years are being satisfied in other ways.

As Fury's audience has both broadened and become more focused (more people, but falling into sharper distinct buckets (eg work people, friends, google searchers, family, and randoms) I have more trouble self-justifying posts I think about writing. I don't necessarily want to talk to people at work about random dermatological issues (not that there are any, really. Just a hypothetical example). I don't want to talk about upcoming vacations because now that I own my own house, I somehow feel that a cyberstalker breaking in and stealing from me is a greater violation than if they broke into a place I rented, and as the holidays approach, I'm reluctant to have the more personal aspects of my life become kitchen-gossip when my family comes together for Christmas next week.

All in all, I'm coming to terms with the fact that most people who I read online have either migrated toward the livejournal model intended to disseminate relevant life stuff to friends for whom it is actually relevant, or those more highbrow bloggers who have, whether they've noticed it or not, excised their literal personal life from their online presence, showing themselves only through inductance, choosing to pass on this interesting thing on the web, or providing social commentary on this other thing that happened to someone else.

I'm not sure where I fit. Fury has always been about a lack of focus, and whenever I try to narrow the blog, even if it's by splitting it, readers have said the wandering nature is one of the more appealing things about the blog.

So, in the spirit of wantering, I leave you without a conclusion. I hope you'll comment with whatever thoughts this meander sparks in you. I'm still working on the next iteration of Fury, which will be as drastic an information-architecture redesign as it is a visual shift. I'm hoping to make a good balance between the 'inverse-chronological log of compositions' and the more static structured heirarchical site. Think of it as the stage that follows the path from archive-by-month to categories to multiple-categories (or tags). Anyhow, hopefully I'll be able to stop rambling soon and once again produce meaningful work.

Till then, it's your turn...