In my bid to create an award-winning blog that gains world-wide recognition and acquires me a Prius, a round-the-world holiday and a Thermomix (cause they are the sort of things you get offered as a top blogger – don’t anyone kill the dream) I am trying to embrace all the social media/apps/fads that are currently flying around the blogosphere.
I have a tendency to sign up for these things and then have absolutely no idea of their purpose or even how to use them.
This weeks favourite is Pinterest.
I have been a magazine addict for as long as I can remember. Mountains of them. Strewn around the house collecting dust and eating into my children’s opportunity to go to university. No dear we can’t afford that Visual Arts degree Mummy just had to have those magazine subscriptions.
I have boxes full of tear sheets that I simply can’t throw away because one day it may be important for me to know just what Collette Dinnigan had on the runway at the 1998 Fashion Week or I will urgently need to cook the Double Roasted Suckling Pig with Recado Rojo, Salsa Crudo and Parmesan Encrusted Potatoes on the side (because seriously I’ve got a couple of days to devote to a single meal).
Then I discovered Pinterest is really just the grown-up, on-line version of my ripped up magazines that I have carted from house to house for years. It’s a lot cheaper and takes up far less room.
When I log in (particularly to my “likes” page) I see my ultimate life spread out before me. Let me tell you in Pinterest world I am stylish (I’m also a size 8). No really I have great taste, classic and refined. Bearing absolutely no resemblance to the hurriedly put together, barely brushed hair, slightly ill-fitting clothes of my reality. My office is a quirky, book filled sanctuary with a comfy, overstuffed chair next to a sunlit window. Not the spare room with an assortment of junk that I am still trying to sort, a fold-up chair in the middle next to half unpacked boxes I’m desperately trying to empty and ditch the contents as a form of therapy in overcoming my hoarding tendencies. I live in a beautifully landscaped home with an azure pool inviting us all in for a dip, not a building site with a gaping hole that fills with muddy water every time it rains.
Aside from fanning the flames of my discontent I am still trying to figure out how the hell this site is supposed to generate readers for your blog? To my surprise I discovered Mamamia (one of Australia’s biggest most successful websites) and Oprah’s Things were following my fantasy life on Pinterest. Now if they were following the BLOG that would be exciting but now I’m a little confused at what my value is in this highly visual, style swamped world.
Obviously I still need to figure out what a text-based blog has to “pin” – there’s my brother’s photos of course but considering they really belong to him probably not a great idea to have them repinned to the point where nobody knows where they came from in the beginning – he’s agreed to let me put some up but then he has no idea what Pinterest is so not sure how valid his consent will be when somebody else makes millions from one of his shots – probably as likely as the Prius arriving in my driveway but you never know.
There are genuine concerns over the copyright issue – it’s one thing to cut out my favourites pictures and articles and keep them forever and day – another to take other’s images and post them online. Blogging with Amy had a useful post on this issue.
In the meantime I continue to “like” and occasionally “pin” the images of my dream life while wondering if there is any actual blogging benefit.
So bloggers has Pinterest generated readers for your blog? Any bloggers happy to be “pinned”? Readers is anyone else addicted to magazines or is it just me?
You are not alone! Im a mag addict and have been since i was 12 years old. Cant explain it-just gotta have that latest glossy. Its handy i work for a great publishing company too!
So glad I’m not the only one. Seriously I’m keeping the local newsagencies in business.
I swear we are twins separated at birth! I would show you the pile of magazines I have but they don’t just pile horizontally any more! And the Tear Sheets! Yay, I will tell you the first time I find something on Oprah’s sight that I saw on your site first!
Glad to know you are on the job. Notice I only photographed a small selection – they are everywhere – I go to throw them out them end up rereading them and ripping pages out as I go. It drives my husband insane.
I got rid of my husband, more room for magazines! Kidding, if you have a good one, keep him!
I haven’t figured out the blogging benefit to Pinterest yet. I also haven’t figured out how to get more followers on Instagram yet. I need more time in a day.
I also really love magazines. To the extent that every two years or so I go online and order free catalogs from as many home decor places as possible just so I can go through and rip out what I like. That’s how I created the home inspiration binder that I have. Currently I’m sort of accumulating recipe cut-outs and a collection of cool menus/business cards. Now I need to figure out what to do with those as well…
I love magazines…have a great pile in our guest bath at the moment (put there after a complaint from my dad), and I’ve kept years and YEARS of magazines..some of which I’ve moved across the country TWICE! Sometimes you do have time to settle in with a book, but a magazine! There’s always time to skim through a magazine! And pinterest…Hmmm. I’m there, I love the idea of it, but frankly? I keep forgetting about it! I clearly need to get better at it.
I love magazines! So much that I have a pile that I’ve moved across the country TWICE! Sometimes you don’t have time to settle into a book, but a magazine? There’s always time to skim through an article or two in a magazine. And regarding pinterest, while I love the idea of it, I keep forgetting about it so clearly I’m doing something wrong!
I want to be pinned but I have free printables to download and projects on my site. I look to see who’s pinned stuff from my site and that’s pretty fun. I feel about Twitter the way you feel about Pinterest. Why use it? Who can be clever or insightful in 140 characters? I can’t! I quit Twitter. It’s very cool that you have some high-profile followers! (Ez from Creature Comforts is following me… she’s never pinned any of my pins but still ;-p )
I LOVE pinterest. I created a board just to pin my blog posts to it but I’m not convinced it works for a generating more people to your blog kind of thing. But from a purely indulgent point of view, pinterest is when I get a cuppa and have some “me” time. I too seem to sign up to things and have no idea how to use them. I only just discovered I have a heap of people following me on Instagram…and I’ve never posted a pic. I had no idea that people actually followed you on Instagram, I thought it was just a clever photo filter LOL.
That was me too – then I had followers when I was trying to figure out how to use the darn thing and accidently spammed them with multiple self-portraits. On twitter I had followers before I’d sent a single tweet – they were dedicated followers of my silence – then when I did actually tweet I was afraid I would lose them all because they would be people who preferred me mute.