The first blog known to man was published in the seventh century by a wild hunter who went by the name of Elvis Beowulf. Beowulf ‘s blog gives us a great insight into seventh century Britain.
From Dan Brown’s illuminating translation published in 2004 and the movie based on it (New Wolves on the Blog starring Tom Hanks, Sharon Stone and Madonna) we are able to learn a lot about early Anglican blogging.
His entry for February 29th 694 is especially enlightening:
I woke early this morning. For breakfast I killed an owl and washed it down with two tankers of home made ale. I woke up in the afternoon feeling lucky. I walked outside, ignoring the bodies that had piled up by the river and treated myself to the remains of the wild boar I had been saving since Christmas. I washed it down with two tankers of ale.
I woke up in the morning. It was raining again. The whether man had promised sun. I hit him over the head with my iron and went back to my ale. I kept the man’s carcass for a rainy day, thus inventing irony…
The first blog to receive national acclaim was of course the Canterbury Blogue
The first blog to receive national acclaim was of course the Canterbury Blogue, now known as the Canterbury Tales, first published in the late 14th century. In a collection of 279 separate writings, Geoffrey Chaucer related what went on during a road trip to the massage parlors of Bathe, taken by himself and fellow members of the London Fornographic Society.
Since then millions upon millions of blogs have been published by men, women, children and Siamese cats around the globe.
Eight months ago I came to the conclusion that it was about time that I too started a blog. “I will publish all my satire poetry and songs on-line and millions of readers will fall in love with me”, I said to myself in my most convincing voice. “I will be famous – the new Elvis (or Cliff or Paul or Michael – your choice.)”.
And I waited and waited and waited
So I sat myself down for a fortnight of long nights and wrote a dozen of the wittiest blog articles I could come up with and waited (I was reading Godot at the time so it seemed fitting). And I waited and waited and waited.
After a couple of weeks I found Google Analytics. Great news I now had 8 readers a day (nine on Sundays) and that included all of my children, a couple of my friends who owed me favors, an illiterate Aborigine and Mini my Pekingese wonderdog who will do anything for a treat.
After eight days of immersing myself into what Google had to offer, I discovered that Analytics allows you to compare your site to a benchmark. Hurray, according to Google I was already 450,374% better than my benchmark. Within weeks I should be a millionaire. I was going to be famous. I was already calculating how much to ask for the movie rights.
I now had between 12 to 14 people a day, and 3 of them weren’t even relatives
Three months passed and my blog had really taken off. I now had between 12 to 14 people a day, and 3 of them weren’t even relatives. Success was on its way. I wrote and I wrote and I wrote.
I read everything there was to read about creating a successful blog. I took a post graduate course in SEO, I posted my blog on every forum, blog list and index I could find. I facebooked and twittered till my fingers were numb. I signed up for AdSense and Amazon Associates and earned the incredible sum of $0.13.
One night I found Alexa.com, the site that gives you your site ranking, and that really made my day. My site was ranked 15,457,341. That, translated into layman’s terms means that when all the people out there, with nothing better to do with their lives than read idiotic blogs like this one, finally finish reading the 15,457,340 sites ranking above mine, they will give me a call.
According to the calculations of my excel spreadsheet, taking into account the current growth on my blog and the amount of people who click on the ads hidden around my site I should be making at least $1.75 a month by the year 2032.
I’m going out now to get myself well and truly drunk at the local Bloggers Bar
I don’t know about you, but I’m going out now to get myself well and truly drunk at the local Bloggers Bar. If the millions of readers check into my site before I get back please tell them I’m on my way.
Steve Taite is an IT project manager who’s body hides a frustrated writer. His blog is his outlet for what he sees happening around. Sometimes he is serious but more often than not he tends to look at life in a satirical humorous fashion. Want to guest post on HowToMakeMyBlog? See more info here.
Image by AZ Rain Man.
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{ 6 comments }
What a way to kickstart my Monday morning! Really interested to visit that guy’s own blog.
Thanks for the complement
I am presently in the midde of moving from blogger to wordpress which is worthy of a blog on its own
Funny. I’m new too except I haven’t told anyone I know that I blog so when I got my first visit and comment you would have thought I won the lottery.
I registered for Alexa and look at my stats once. It was too depressing. The same on Technorati.
I’m still having fun and that’s what matters.
Thanks for the set off. Your article is too much interesting and teaches so many things to fresher and experience blogger
Bloggers bar, good idea, and why not. They have oxygen bars, right–and blogging, as far as I’m concerned, is more pleasant than sticking a couple of oxygen tubes up your nose. Think of all the good blogging ideas you could glean from other bloggers, if you get them drunk enough, and they from you . . . kind of like cooperative cannabalism. And as for humor, yeah it’s essential. Lets all lighten up, if only for the sake of fewer calories.
Love the idea of a Bloggers Bar – so long as its not virtual – virtual beer is worth what you pay for it! Hilarious post!