I looked up where the word ‘blog’ comes from this morning - it’s a portmanteau of the words ‘web log’. So in the original sense of the term, this should probably be something more like a diary, something that documents my life. That said, a lot of my life at the moment consists of worrying about exams, so I think it’s best if we sneakily ignore that definition right now.
Then there’s the word vlog. My friend Verity complains whenever I use it, because it doesn’t conform to the phonological rules of English (in plain words, you don’t get ‘vl’ at the beginning of syllables in English), but I like it. And funnily enough, although it’s the newer term, it’s actually closer to the original definition of blog. Vlogs are a specific genre of online video, in which a person uses their videos as a form of diary, or to document things they’re thinking about. Anything else does not fall under that heading.
I’ve always felt a bit sceptical about starting up my own vlog, because there are a lot of very good YouTube vloggers out there, and I’m fairly sure no one would be that interested in my life. “But Megan,” you say, “that doesn’t stop you blogging about it.” Yes, but on tumblr, there’s much less of an emphasis on viewing figures. The first thing I look at when I go to one of my own videos is the number of views and the number of likes. The first thing I look at when I’m on my blog is the blog, because those statistics aren’t there.
(Side note: yes, I do reread my own blogs and rewatch my own videos. Seriously, if I weren’t creating stuff that I liked, how on earth could I justify wanting other people to like it?)
In a way, I feel like when I blog, I’m just throwing this out into the void, and if people are interested, well, good for them. But if I put something out on YouTube, I have to watch the numbers creeping up, and I have to confront the fact that I’m actively trying to get people to watch, rather than just letting it go and doing it for my own good.
Don’t get me wrong - I like making videos. Bizarrely, I really enjoy editing. That’s the bit that most people like least, but I genuinely enjoy video editing. It just appeals to the pedant in me, I suppose. It’s so wonderfully finicky! And I like writing and planning videos, because I like writing and… well, planning. I suppose the bit I like least is the actual filming, and I still enjoy that, particularly when there’s glorious weather and I can go hang out on the quad with a camera. So I am doing this for me, it just feels like there’s more pressure. A sort of tension between enjoying myself and feeling like I have to do this well.
Hmph. I’m not coming to any conclusions here. I think I’ll have to pull a Peter van Houten and
