'I have hopped off again!'
Perhaps, as I contemplate falling advertising revenue and almost complete absence of reader reaction on this blog, I should consider doing something different.
Maybe I should pack up this blog and join the ranks of Twitterites, who seem prepared to share any dismal detail of their lives, no matter how uninteresting to the rest of us.
The comments to this blog have all but dried up, and advertising revenue is almost non-existent.
Readership, oddly, is rising, but if I can't have reader reaction and even a pittance of advertising revenue to reward my efforts, I would rather not bother.
So, here is a plea to readers: if you have something to say, please say it.
Otherwise, you might open this blog one day and find it given over to the banal chitter chatter of Twitterites instead.
Gone will be more considered responses about what it means to get on and off that bus in Bangkok.
Gone will be Maiyuu's 'take' on his farang boyfriend, or what this farang happens to think of him.
Almost no Thai bloggers give you accounts of day-to-day life in this city. BOTM2 virtually alone in that regard, and the others, in my opinion, aren't worth reading.
Up to you.
7 comments:
ReplyDeleteAnonymous21 December 2010 at 06:28
I've always enjoyed reading about Ball on BOTM2, but there hasn't been any update since quite a while now. The celebrity stories here, on the other hand, aren't half as interesting.
ReplyDelete
Anonymous21 December 2010 at 11:47
You only post every 3-8 days now and lately it has been Thailand soap opera drivel. Too little and too boring. You have been told before repeatedly that your readers will find the most mundane details of daily Thai life interesting. It's new to us. Its different for us, and it's why we look at your blog. But you just can't seem to "get it". I guess you must write what you find interesting, but unfortunately not many seem to share your in terests. Do you remember "Gay Boy Thailand"?? he wrote about Thai life. Try it.
ReplyDelete
Michael Lomker21 December 2010 at 14:28
@Anon may not have stated it politely but I concur with much of it. The self-induced drama of your adopted Thai family created a lot of comments because people enjoyed speculating about you flirting with an 18yr old while having a boyfriend at home. People agreed, people disagreed...that's what creates comments and gets people to come back. Now the posts are infrequent and you're a comfortable goody-two-shoes/father figure and that's just boring.
You act older than you actually are, which was always odd to me. You rarely talk about your work, surely there is material there. You haven't mentioned your crazy farang friends lately. No Thai's have shown up in the middle of the night? There are so many "only in Thailand" things that you could be sharing if you wanted to.
ReplyDelete
ReplyDeleteBkkdreamer21 December 2010 at 17:01
Anon 1: I have avoided writing about Ball and family to give readers a break. I am happy to go back to it, but I want to write about it only if there are signs of progress.
Drama is all very well, but if it the same old, same old day after day - Ball struggles with drinking, girlfriend battles with farang visitor - I'd rather wait until something more substantial develops.
Anon 2: Be careful what you wish for! Silom's writing was fun because we imagined him as an outsider.
He was the unsuspecting farang venturing into alien Thai territory, alternately charmed/annoyed by the mysterious ways of the Thais he met, including his boyfriend.
In fact, Silom is a more astute observer of Thai life than most of us, including me.
He wasn't putting it on. To be honest, I don't know how he did it. But he was able to write as if he was still new to the place. Every strange scene in the soi read as if it was a first-time experience, even if he had seen it all before.
After 10 years here, I find it hard to write with such a fresh pair of eyes. Or maybe I just don't have as much fun as I imagine Silom was having, in those days when he still wrote a blog.
I am willing to experiment with a daily diary. It might have to be unvarnished description...I will leave it up to readers to form an opinion of what is happening, as I can't fake weary cynicism, astonishment or whatever. Silom ran a daily diary, which I thought was one of the best parts of his blog.
I am busy in the second part of the week, which is why posts tail off during that time. However, that shouldn't stop readers commenting, or visiting.
Michael: No Thais show up in the middle of the night...that phase passed years ago.
My mad farang friends...if they do anything outrageous, I will let you know.
I keep work out of the blog, because I don't wish to be identified! Or if people work do know I write this blog, I don't want to rub it in.
I enjoy less anonimity than you might think. The BOTM2 blog contains a scene of the Bangkok skyline, taken from my condo, in the header field.
Within weeks of that picture appearing, a farang who lives in this condo complex asked me if I was the author of the BOTM blog. I bumped in to him in the courtyard outside.
A few weeks ago, a farang friend of his who lives in my building introduced himself as a regular reader of this blog. We met in the lift.
The more my anonimity as a blogger diminishes, the less I am able to write with gay abandon (pardon the pun).
My boyfriend is another one who knows about this blog. He still reads it occasionally. Thankfully he does not drop by too often, or he might be anoyed by what I have posted.
ReplyDelete
Anonymous22 December 2010 at 09:00
ReplyDeleteYou absolutely CAN write with the "fresh vision" of Farang Silom, but you have to try. That vision is like a muscle that you can develop. The more you exercise it the more it will grow. The added bonus is that it will simultaneously enhance your life experience in Thailand. Think of it as bringing along a friend to experience a natural wonder for the first time, but that you have visited many times. You will have a renewed joy in the experience seen through your friends eyes. Don't be lazy! Work it!
ReplyDelete
Anonymous22 December 2010 at 09:02
FYI I had to hit "post comments" 3 times and then enter the scrambled letters to post. You may be loosing many comments because people give up, thinking it broken, before hitting post 3 times
ReplyDelete
Bkkdreamer22 December 2010 at 16:29
Anon: Thank you. I am keen to try a daily diary, as said above. I tried it out yesterday (see the post which appears after this one).
It will not strictly be a 'daily' diary, as I am too busy some days to write. You are unlikely to see much out of me for the next two days, for example, as I am working overtime in addition to my usual job.
However, posting frequency should increase overall.
Re comments...thanks once again. I didn't know I had imposed that awful scrambled letters requirement. I have lifted it.
ReplyDelete