November = NaBloPoMo
“National Blog Posting Month” was invented by Eden Kennedy in 2006 for those of us that were never going to have a chance at “National Novel Writing Month” (where the truly insane try to write a 50,000 word novel during November).The challenge is simply to post something on each day of November.
I guess you have to remember that NaBloPoMo started beforeTwitter, Tumblr, or Facebook exploded across the web – before the “social” internet had evolved. People didn't used to share as much, or as often online – it wasn't unusual for a typical blog to go a week without a post, because posts tended to be in the order of a few hundred words – not just a few sentences, and nobody had a phone that could take photographs, let alone share them instantly to anywhere and everywhere.
The real fun for me taking part in NaBloPoMo is not the writing – it's the excuse to read others blogs, to cross paths with interesting people, and to make new friends. I still keep in touch with a number of the people I met in 1996 – that says it all really.
Of course NaBloPoMo has been bought and sold over the years – it's current custodians are the BlogHer network, who have commoditised it, and run it everymonth. I'm going to ignore their idiocy, and take it back to grass roots. If a few of us post on our own, and tag our posts with NaBloPoMo throughout November, who cares what the rest of the world is doing.
So who's in? Why wants to write, post, and comment throughout November?