2008 Blog Resolutions

Happy New Year!

It's a brand-new year, which means that it's time for some New Year's resolutions. Instead of the usual resolutions, I'm posting resolutions dealing exclusively with blogging and writing. Here we go...

1. Post More Consistently:
Blogging-wise, 2007 was a slow year for me. How slow? Well, not only did I actually forget my blog's fourth anniversary (it was December 18), but I posted only 87 posts on my blog in all of 2007. I posted only 30 articles on BC Magazine and 14 articles on ThaHipHop.com. I posted the most this year on MOG.

2007 was the first full year that I worked a full-time job. In some respects, I haven't really reconciled working and blogging. I'm never going to be the most prolific blogger out there. I would just like to post more often. Quality is always going to be more important to me than quantity. However, there's just no excuse for me to post only once in an entire month like I did here in September.

2. Write A Greater Variety Of Posts:
Even though I write for four sites (here, MOG, BC Magazine, and ThaHipHop.com), most of what I write breaks down to one word: review. I really enjoy writing reviews. They're fun to write and sometimes they are quite a challenge. I like shaking up the types of things I review from hip-hop music to shoujo anime. I also like finding new ways to write reviews.

I think I'm capabale of writing more than just reviews and I'd like to explore that in the things I post in 2008. Part of me is a bit frightened (and lazy) about doing this. Reviews are a nice comfort zone for me. I've done news posts before for BC Magazine but they're time-consuming because I have a higher standard for such posts than any type of review. The same is true of opinion posts. If I'm going to give my opinion on anything other than a creative work, I have to make sure I'm on my A+ game.

Doing a bigger variety of posts will be a challenge but it will probably result in making me a better writer overall. That would be well worth the troubles I may face along the way.

3. Attempt Non-Blog Writing:
Just like how many people always put “lose weight” on their New Year's resolution list, I put up some sort of resolution about trying to do some non-blog writing (fiction, skit, script, etc.). No matter how “inspired” I get, it's supremely hard to start and stick with a story. I am going to keep trying until I can get it to stick, dammit.

4. Do Some Exclusive Posts:
At the low points in my blogging career, this blog is basically an exact replica of the work I do for BC Magazine, work that I post there first. Unless it's a post about something going on in my life (or a “lazy” review), what I write will appear somewhere else in addition to here.

I've been planning to start writing more stuff for this blog only so as to give readers a reason to actually visit here in the first place. In addition to posting more, I will post more stuff for this blog exclusively. I have a few ideas rattling around and I'll reveal them as soon as I get around to enacting them.

5. Appear On A Podcast:
For a brief time, I entertained the idea of doing a podcast. That idea disappeared when I realized that I had no idea what kind of show to do.

However, with the BC Radio Network, I'm thinking about calling in one day and making my actual voice known to the world. Even if I only do it once, it would still be kind of cool. I would have to just get over the supreme insecurity that writing naturally hides...

That's all for me. To everyone out there making New Year's resolutions, I wish you the best of luck. Wish me luck too.