It is now 2020, and among the legions of people ‘out there’ in the towns, cities, villages and communities many have arrived at the realisation that they need to get with the program of publishing content on the web.

The 30, or so years which have elapsed since the WWW has become available to us all has seen our western society changing in some very significant ways; and the web is the medium which has been the agency of most of this change.

Human beings are all about communication, this is what separates us from every other creature on this planet, the modalities of our communication have always determined the shape of our society. When ‘broadcast’ was the primary format, we passively absorbed the 24/7 streams of content which were produced by a small group of media owners, consortiums and investment boards which were aligned with the official world and granted licenses to broadcast.

Television, radio and cinema, these were the conduits from which were were all immersed in the communication stream.

The World Wide Web, via the internet, has changed the game in a big way.

We are witnessing a dramatic change, a shift in the focus of communication, we as individuals, and private companies can now become fully fledged ‘media platform’ owners in our own right. The attention of people has certainly, and obviously shifted away from the only sources of content that were available, our smartphones and our other computer-based devices provide the means for all kinds of independently produced content to be distributed and presented to us as we move about in our days and nights.

This move away from the ownership of broadcast media platforms, the television and radio networks, the cinema giants has seen an explosion of alternative and completely independent digital media production.

We are no longer passive, or helpless, at the mercy of propagandists and narrow sources of accounts. We have a plethora of narratives, of varying qualities, but this multiplication of the media options represents a cultural change of gears; many are uncomfortable, many do not fully understand the implications, and many are also seeking to discredit this change.

Blogging is an area of online publication that has seen a truly dramatic rate of development. Today building a blog is probably one of the most powerful options which is open to you and I to get our ideas, work, and identity ‘out there’ in front of those people who are most likely to be interested in what we do.

We need to be looking at blogging as a publication exercise, people think that publishing a book is the shortest route to building a reputation and reaching people, but there are millions of people who read blogs, and who will see you in their online travels. Blogging is way more powerful than writing a book.

We can include additional media types to augment, and enhance our position: podcasting, and videos are incredibly popular.

With our blog, we can publish podcasts and videos equally well, along with our writing.

This potential, to assemble a media feast in the one location, is often not fully appreciated.

From the location of our blog, we can then distribute our work widely.

The opportunity of being a platform owner is a considerable one.

Of course it all takes time, energy, effort and consistent steps if we are going to break through and establish ourselves; there is no such thing as viral overnight success.

But consider the situation of only 25 years ago, when the idea of being able to build your own media channel, and create your own content which can be widely distributed was completely out of the ballpark for most people, this was a matter of paying a literal fortune over to PR, and media owners, even if you factor in a little social media advertising, today’s media opportunities are off the scale in comparison.

Blogging is a practice that suits many different subject areas.

Today blogging is all about subject development, it can represent the path to liberation for many independent players, and this is why you need to begin thinking seriously about your own project.

Many people are daunted by the range of options, the sheer scope of technical demands for publishing online. 

I am seeing a lot of people being convinced to go with options that will not help them very much in the long term.

This concerns me, because I don’t like to see good people being exploited and misled.

Always, work towards being an independent entity, avoid the media conglomerates, the Silicon Valley platforms because you will just be absorbed and obscured by their scale.

Today you have the possibility of obtaining your own unique brand name = domain name. With this you can work a minor miracle if you go about it in the right way.

If you want to build your own media project, and be supported, then let’s talk.