On internet writing

I love the idea of looking at the writing and rhetoric of the blogger. I don't love READING the writing and rhetoric of most bloggers as much. I read Lance Mannion...his latest post had me laughing as it started out with the description of evesdropping at Starbucks. That's a totally random moment that I have lived through a million times, especially since I am embarrassing addicted to mocha-loca-latte-supremos, and the oatmeal cookies are unbelievable. But I digress...and so did Lance. I think the internet has fostered the development of a kind of "brain dump" writing style. A blog, even more than a diary, allows the writer to go on and on and on...you never have to worry about running out of paper or turning the page or the pen drying up. About the only limit is carpal tunnel.

Lance has some good stuff in his site, but some of it, especially that last post, is excruciatingly detailed. If this were appearing in any other forum, it would be edited in some form or another.

Okay, so is the brain-dump aesthetic a bad thing? I guess not. I'm just brain dumping right now. It's not hurting anyone, it allows us bloggers to just say whatever we want to say without much or any editing or filtering,other than what we impose on ourselves. So it is a great form of self-expression, even if it is a bit tedious to wade through at times. But no one has to wade through if they don't want to, right? So maybe the value is in self-expression, even if a lot of the blogging writing in stream-of-consciousness.