Discussions yes, blogs no?

[F, Calla & Luca]

It seems that Adina is concerned that sometimes the blog format is used when a discussion would be more appropriate. This has led her to screen blogs, a time consuming task and a delay in publishing blogs.Yet Adina is reluctant to do away with blogs because of the archived blogs we have, 2500 versus nearly 8,000 discussions. Why not consider just keeping the archives but not having blogs going forward? People could still tell anecdotes and blog-like things in a discussion format. If a response about something in the original post, or to something someone else has said came up it always works best in this format. There is no way to do that in a blog and the meaning of a response is sometimes unclear in terms of to whom you are responding or even what you are trying to convey. You can edit your response in a limited time frame in a discussion. All in all, it seems to me that the discussion format is the better one and I think we don't need the blog format. It is possible that there may be a technical reason this won't work but it seems a note indicating that all future posts should be discussion would solve this. What do you think?

[Frannie & Callie]

I agree with this - I like to write silly stories about Callie et al and I love to read other stories of DK doods and owners. To me, discussions are informative, blogs are anecdotal and are "optional" reads. That said, I could always write about Callie in my personal blog (which I've totally stopped writing in because I blog so frequently here!) if the blog feature were to go away.

[Christine & Shelby]

Just for the record... I love your silly stories about Darwin! I am happy the blogs are staying :o)

[Camilla and Darwin]

thanks. :-)

[shelly]

I agree with Camilla... What is the harm if we just leave the blog? Is it that you (Adina) have to check all the blogs first before publishing? 'Cause THAT could be very time consuming for you. Does the blog NOT have the ability in it to remove a blog like the forum discussion if something is written that ffends someone?

[Karen, Jasper and Jackdoodle]

I agree as well. I don't worry about being long-winded, lol, but sometimes it's nice to tell a story that doesn't call for discussion, isn't all that important, and is indeed more of a journal entry or diary type musing that you just want to share with whoever may be interested.
And I think there are topics for which the only appropriate response is a simple message of sympathy or support, and I do think discussion can take away the focus away from that sometimes, particularly the comments to other people's comments. I'm as guilty of it as anyone, I'm sure, but sometimes it almost seems a little disrespectful of the original poster.

[Adina P]

I hear what you're saying and in most other just-forum sites everything goes into the forum because it's ALL forum. But since we have blogs...AND we've used blogs, I can't close them from future use without making them inaccessible. So there's just not even any use debating the idea.

Part of the reason they are the way they are (without the option to discuss and reply to replies) is this is the style of blogs throughout the web for the most part. One can set a publishing date (as you can on Doodle Kisses blogs) and there are only comments TO the blog rather than comments to comments. It's kind of standard across the internet. Check out various blogspot.com blogs or wordpress blogs and you'll see that for the most part it's like this too.

[F, Calla & Luca]

I do understand, Adina. But I am a believer in debate and a believer in change or that change is possible. It is after all the focus of what I do. Also, just because others have done or are doing something is not a reason to avoid thinking of other ways to do things. After all where would we be if Al Gore hadn't invented the internet : ) Someday Ning might have a way that could allow access to old blogs even if new blogs were not an option. Soon this discussion will be off the front page and out of sight is out of mind, for the most part.

[Lesley, Wellington & Bingley]

Awwwwww, I love the blogs! If I have a question or a topic that I think will interest others I would put it in the discussion part. But if I just want to prattle on about my day/week/how much I love my doodle I write a blog....

Does it have to be lots of work to maintain? Don't want to cause lots of work but I love the blogs.