My attitude to blogging has shifted over time. At first I took it all at face value. Gradually I started hating the apparent dominance of snake-oil-selling blo

My attitude to blogging has shifted over time. At first I took it all at face value. Gradually I started hating the apparent dominance of snake-oil-selling bloggers. Then I decided that there was more to it than I first thought and am preparing a strategy that fits in blogging with my other goals. Consider: what is the art of promotion, but another form of power? It can be abused, just like programming skills can be abused for malicious purposes, but it can also be applied to contribute to other efforts. Blogging is a worthy cross-promotional tool, and it could give you the star power necessary to start a community or a collaborative project from scratch. And in the meantime, ad monetization gives a little bit of reward for building a strong site. And you don't have to work within the "make regular posts on vapid topics" cycle to succeed: Good posts on niche subjects can go a long way, especially if you stick to making them search-friendly "evergreen" articles and not pure news/rumor/opinion. While you can't compete with the likes of Demand Media on quantity, you can exploit specialty subjects far better.