{"id":3893,"date":"2021-02-09T13:15:59","date_gmt":"2021-02-09T19:15:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/jahangiri.us\/2020\/?p=3893"},"modified":"2026-03-17T16:27:40","modified_gmt":"2026-03-17T21:27:40","slug":"a-little-trip-down-memory-lane","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jahangiri.us\/2020\/a-little-trip-down-memory-lane\/","title":{"rendered":"A Little Trip Down Memory Lane"},"content":{"rendered":"

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I was blogging when Blogger, co-founded by Medium\u2019s founder, Ev Williams<\/a>, was still a baby. You might say that I\u2019ve come full circle. You\u2019ll see, in a moment, how little has changed in the past two decades.<\/p>\n

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Blogging in the \u201cOlden Days\u201d: A reflection on how things have changed in 15 years of blogging<\/h2>\n

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There Are Adults Who Haven\u2019t Been Alive as Long as I\u2019ve Been Blogging<\/h3>\n

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One of my first blog posts was me trying to define what the heck \u201cblogging\u201d was \u2014 I didn\u2019t imagine anyone else would read it, and no one knew back then that \u201cthe Internet is forever.\u201d<\/p>\n

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At some point, before the term \u201cvanity surfing\u201d was coined, I searched for my own name and found a mention in The Hindustan Times<\/a>, where my definition of blogging was quoted and I was referred to as a \u201cveteran blogger.\u201d Once I stopped laughing and realized what a venerable publication that really was, and not some little fly-by-night website like my own, I was stunned. I wrote to their tech columnist, Deepak Mankar<\/a>, and confessed to him that I was anything but a veteran blogger, but thanked him for the compliment of quoting me in the newspaper and calling me one.<\/p>\n

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Neither of us can find that clip, now \u2014 but at least I made a friend!<\/p>\n

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Before There Was Blogging<\/h4>\n

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Mark Zuckerberg did not invent \u201csocial media.\u201d<\/p>\n

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My first online chat happened on CompuServe in 1981, and by 1989, I was working as an unpaid moderator (SysOp) on GEnie. The Writers\u2019 Ink RoundTable \u2014 the first to \u201chire\u201d me \u2014 had a forum, a chat room, and a place to store files. I\u2019d say it was at least<\/em> as much of a \u201csocial network\u201d as any overcrowded, contentious platform we think of as such, today. And somewhere in between, there were independent little user-run \u201cbulletin boards\u201d (BBSes) that had chats, online games, and more. Your parents weren\u2019t running around with the dinosaurs, kids.<\/p>\n

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GEnie LiveWire Magazine<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

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I See Dead Trees<\/h4>\n

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In the early days of the commercial Internet (around 1994\u20132002), there were printed directories of websites, categorized like the Yellow Pages, and sold in brick and mortar bookstores. I had no idea, until tonight, that I was featured in one of them!<\/p>\n

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From Writer\u2019s Internet Sourcebook, by Levin, Michael Graubart (1997)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

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My first website, Scraps & Scribbles, or The Writer\u2019s Corner, was a writing site. It was, as the book above says, \u201ca list of links.\u201d I only started it because I wanted to learn HTML, and all the websites back in 1994 or so consisted of rudimentary lists of programmers\u2019 CD collections. That seemed awfully boring, so I focused on what I knew and started a writing site. There weren\u2019t many, back then. But let me tell you in my own words \u2014from nearly 20 years ago:<\/p>\n

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Tuesday, April 17, 2001<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

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A Short History of Scraps & Scribbles<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

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When I first started Scraps & Scribbles<\/a> (originally called The Writers Corner), several years ago*, my main goal was to learn HTML. That didn\u2019t seem like reason enough to add clutter to the Internet, and I couldn\u2019t see me doing another one of those \u201cHello world, this is me, isn\u2019t my CD collection just the kewlest?\u201d personal home pages.<\/em><\/p>\n

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I was determined, from the start, to provide links to some of the best<\/strong> writing resources on the Internet \u2014 not just to collections of other people\u2019s favorite links, but to sites containing primary content of interest to writers and readers.<\/em><\/p>\n

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Turned out to be a fairly time-consuming endeavor. And there weren\u2019t 50 gazillion writers\u2019 sites on the Internet then, as there are now. Just finding some of them proved to be a daunting task.<\/em><\/p>\n

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Always, tucked into a deep corner in the back of my mind, was this nagging feeling that some of that \u201cprimary content\u201d really ought to be written by me<\/strong>. The other nagging feeling, not quite relegated to that dark corner of the mental basement, was that I was already spending too much time online! (Anyone here remember the movie, \u201cThe Beast in the Cellar\u201d?) Anyway\u2026<\/em><\/p>\n

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Flash forward to January 2001. I discovered two \u201cnew\u201d things to play around with, and threw myself into them with zeal. The first was the \u201cpay-per-click\u201d writing sites, like Epinions and Themestream. I wouldn\u2019t have found Themestream, if not for the fact that Epinions temporarily shut down while their site was being redesigned.<\/em><\/p>\n

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Don\u2019t ask me what\u2019s addictive about writing for a site that pays a measly $.02 or less each time someone reads your work. Even though technically it\u2019s worth less<\/strong> than a token payment, like contributor\u2019s copies of a print anthology, it\u2019s money.<\/strong> Legal tender. In four months and 40+ articles, I earned a whole hour\u2019s wages. (I do write for a living.) I\u2019ll never see a penny of it, either. Themestream sent out an announcement last week, saying that the company would cease operations on Friday the 13th (how appropriate) and that it would be highly unlikely that they would be able to pay all their creditors \u2014 or their contributors.<\/em><\/p>\n

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But you know what? Thanks in part to Themestream, I finally put my money where my mouth was, got off my duff, and started writing something besides user\u2019s guides \u2014 and now I\u2019m able to move most of those articles to my own<\/strong> Web site. I finally have some of that primary content, not just great links, and it\u2019s mine!<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

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The second thing I discovered to play with on the Internet was Weblogs (like this one!). nPorta\u2019s Logs (www.nporta.com<\/a>) are probably the easiest<\/strong> and fastest to set up and maintain. And they\u2019re easy to change or delete, as well.<\/em><\/p>\n

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Two others are more robust, but these are sites dedicated<\/strong> to \u201cblogging\u201d and don\u2019t offer the same useful, customizable news features, or the handheld\/wireless-friendly design offered by nPorta.<\/em><\/p>\n

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Blogger <\/em><\/strong>(www.blogger.com<\/a>) and Xanga<\/strong> (www.xanga.com<\/a>) are definitely worth a look. I would recommend Blogger to anyone who wants to integrate their log into their own personal Web site (and has FTP access to upload and download their own files). I would suggest Xanga for anyone who might want to set up a free Web site or log but who doesn\u2019t necessarily want to become an HTML guru in the process. Here are some samples, if you\u2019re curious: my Blogger page, integrated into Scraps & Scribbles (http:\/\/users.ev1.net\/~hjahangiri\/blog\/dayjournal.html<\/a>) and my Xanga page (not integrated into the Scraps & Scribbles site, but linking to it; http:\/\/www.xanga.com\/HollyJahangiri<\/a>)<\/em><\/p>\n

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I Am NOT a Publisher!<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

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So don\u2019t ask me to publish your writing on my site. I\u2019d be delighted to do it, but I can live without all the potential legal complications.<\/em><\/p>\n

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I will, however, add links to other people\u2019s writing sites. If you send me an email with the subject:<\/em><\/p>\n

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LINK for Scraps and Scribbles<\/em><\/p>\n

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I will add a link to your site, provided:<\/em><\/p>\n

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(a) You include your name, email address, URL, and a brief description (no more than 3\u20135 lines) of your work; and<\/em><\/p>\n

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(b) Your content is not inappropriate (pornographic, hate-mongering, racist, scatological, etc.) Mild erotica, strong opinions (clearly stated as your own and not argued with specious logic), diverse political\/religious views, and such are, of course, fine.<\/em><\/p>\n

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* Scraps & Scribbles has been around, in one form or another, since 1994. Debbie Ridpath Ohi (whom I met in GEnie\u2019s Writer\u2019s Ink RoundTable a couple of years before that) was just beginning to build Inkspot into the deservedly popular writers\u2019 site it was soon to become; and her site was one of the very first links added to mine.<\/em><\/p>\n

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Not much has changed, has it?<\/p>\n

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I may even have found that definition of a weblog that earned me a mention in The Hindustan Times:<\/p>\n

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What,<\/strong> you ask, is a Weblog? A Weblog might be a virtual journal, a daily news update, a group\u2019s bulletin board, or a feature of a Web site. You\u2019re reading a Weblog right now; I use it to post update notices and other tidbits to Scraps & Scribbles, and I can do it from any PC that\u2019s connected to the Internet, any time. This Weblog was created using Blogger (www.blogger.com<\/a>). Blogger lets me create and use my own template, so that my Weblog can be seamlessly integrated into my own Web site. I\u2019m not forced to use someone else\u2019s idea of a cool layout; every element is under my control. I can archive messages, too.<\/p>\n

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\"\"<\/figure>\n

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I was lazy; I just wanted a way to update the contents of my website without having to log in, download and edit pages, save and re-upload them \u2014 there had to be a better way. And that was what I found appealing about Blogger. I could integrate it into my own website, with a little effort, and then update things on the fly, from anywhere.<\/p>\n

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And while I was working, full-time, as a technical writer, designing Windows Help for PCs, and teaching others how to code HTML, other writers moved in and dominated this writing \u201cniche.\u201d Now in 2020, the whole topic of \u201cwriting\u201d is so broad that it\u2019s no longer a niche at all, and doesn\u2019t even count as a topic on some websites and indices. We\u2019re all writers, now; writing about writing is so \u201cmeta.\u201d But I digress.<\/p>\n

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Back in the Olden Days<\/h3>\n

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Once upon a time, we had \u201cweb rings.\u201d These were little bits of code people set up that would act as Previous and Next buttons, but instead of taking you to the next post or page in the blog, Next would take you to the next site in the ring. This is how we turned blogging \u201csocial.\u201d<\/p>\n

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What Ever Happened To Webrings?<\/h3>\n

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Once upon a time, we had \u201cweb rings.\u201d These were little bits of code people set up that would act as Previous and Next buttons, but instead of taking you to the next post or page in the blog, Next would take you to the next site in the ring. This is how we turned blogging \u201csocial.\u201d<\/p>\n

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What Ever Happened To Webrings?<\/strong>
If the words GeoCities, Excite or Alta Vista mean anything to you, then chances are that the word 'webring' triggers a\u2026<\/em>hover.blog<\/a><\/div>\n

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The closest thing we seem to have, now, is Linky Tools and InLinkz:<\/p>\n

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Inlinkz | Blogging tools for link-ups, blog hops and link parties<\/strong>
Create link-ups, link parties and blog hops. Run challenges and increase your loyal followers with the LinkUp tool\u2026<\/em>www.inlinkz.com<\/a><\/div>\n

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And then there were \u201cblogrolls.\u201d I kept asking developers to make mine cinnamon with extra vanilla icing, but they just rolled their eyes and tried to explain that\u2019s not what a \u201cblogroll\u201d meant.<\/p>\n

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Sometimes, it\u2019s fun to play dumb. Till someone believes you are.<\/p>\n

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Rules, Rules \u2014 We Don\u2019t Need No Steenkin\u2019 Rules!<\/h3>\n

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Sharon Hurley Hall wrote, of blogging in the \"olden days,\" \u201cWe were excited about this new way of sharing our writing and we blogged regularly. There were no rules about how long posts should be or what should be included. There were no images, for the most part. It was just you, your words, and your fellow bloggers.\u201d <\/p>\n

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\u00a0<\/div>\n

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Except that\u2019s not how I remember it. <\/strong>Some of us were excited about this new frontier and its lack of rules, but others were excited to invent and pontificate at length about what the rules of blogging were, or ought to be. It was almost as if they had nothing else to write about, so they had to tell everyone else how not to write. I have criticized and satirized these early \u201clisticles\u201d to death, and I urge you to hold fast to the notion that there ought not to be any rules but good writing.<\/p>\n

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By \u201cgood writing,\u201d I simply mean \u201cthat which does not bore the reader to tears and make them beg for death.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Netiquette in the Nineties<\/strong>
I have never understood the need to reinvent the wheel. To improve on it, perhaps. To modify it from a wheel suited to\u2026<\/em>jahangiri.us<\/a><\/div>\n

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Rules for Blogging? NEXT TOPIC!<\/strong>
Sitting here, enjoying a warm cup of coffee from my \"RTFM\" mug, I realize some of you aren't even old enough to\u2026<\/em>jahangiri.us<\/a><\/div>\n

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Sharon<\/a>\u2019s mentioned in it. See? If you can\u2019t beat \u2019em, join \u2019em. And then say, \u201cHere, hold my beer\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n

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https:\/\/jahangiri.us\/2020\/watch-me-break-blogging-rules-i-created<\/a><\/p>\n

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Money for Nothin\u2019<\/h3>\n

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The Internet is full of some of the laziest people I\u2019ve ever run across. They seem to honestly believe that they can earn money doing absolutely nothing \u2014 or by \u201cblogging,\u201d but their definition of it is not Sharon\u2019s or mine, and doesn\u2019t involve writing original material. It means using cheap software and tricks to scrape and spin other people\u2019s content, sell ad space, and earn revenues by getting all their friends to click on the ads.<\/p>\n

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It means shoveling half that cash back into someone else\u2019s $497 web training program on how to do it faster and better.<\/p>\n

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https:\/\/hollyjahangiri.medium.com\/the-story-of-ivan-mor-smirnoff-daa524fc46dd<\/a><\/p>\n

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https:\/\/hollyjahangiri.medium.com\/spin-this-9fcdc2db7753<\/a><\/p>\n

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https:\/\/hollyjahangiri.medium.com\/plagiarism-and-copyright-violations-on-the-rise-again-4081360de443<\/a><\/p>\n

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Or, maybe, they actually did believe they could get rich quick by blogging, and this is why there are 15,973,456,002,009 abandoned blogs and disillusioned former bloggers working in retail and claiming that \u201cblogging is dead.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Blogging makes great business sense if you have a product to sell and plenty to say about that product. If the product is paper, maybe you write about sustainable forestry or less stinky methods of producing paper products. If you\u2019re selling antivirus software, you\u2019ll never run out of cybersecurity topics to write about. But you do need to be an expert, or hire an excellent freelance writer like Sharon Hurley Hall<\/a> who understands enough about the topic to write credibly about it, or you\u2019ll just end up looking foolish.<\/p>\n

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We all know by now, surely, that only a small percentage of writers get filthy rich, and none of them do it in their sleep. But those folks who keep on churning out crap like, \u201cI Made $34,982 on My Last Medium Story, and You Can, Too!\u201d are just getting rich off P.T. Barnum\u2019s \u201csuckers.\u201d<\/p>\n

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https:\/\/medium.com\/rogues-gallery\/i-dont-care-what-you-do-in-your-sleep-cab60bb55a92<\/a><\/p>\n

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They tend to ruin it for the rest of us. How?<\/p>\n

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By running off the audience.<\/p>\n

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In the end, though, those of us who started out blogging for the fun of it, or just to enjoy honing our writing skills on topics of our own choosing, will still be around. Medium feels like that \u201cold school blogging.\u201d There is a community, here, comprised of writers who support and care about one another as people.<\/p>\n

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And slowly, bit by bit, our audience will return.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I was invited – tagged by Ming Qian of Ming Writes to travel back in time and share some blogging memories. Who here is up for a game of #BloggingNostalgiaTag? You? Great! You’re IT!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3914,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_has_post_settings":[],"wds_primary_category":1,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2749,647,7],"tags":[],"hashtags":[],"class_list":["post-3893","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blogging-other-internet-oddities","category-social-media","category-writing"],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-05-09 04:23:19","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jahangiri.us\/2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3893","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jahangiri.us\/2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jahangiri.us\/2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jahangiri.us\/2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jahangiri.us\/2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3893"}],"version-history":[{"count":41,"href":"https:\/\/jahangiri.us\/2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3893\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":137990888,"href":"https:\/\/jahangiri.us\/2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3893\/revisions\/137990888"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jahangiri.us\/2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3914"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jahangiri.us\/2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3893"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jahangiri.us\/2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3893"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jahangiri.us\/2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3893"},{"taxonomy":"hashtags","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jahangiri.us\/2020\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/hashtags?post=3893"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}