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Ask HN: Why does our community enjoy blogging so much?

by abidlabs on 12/29/21, 2:39 AM with 5 comments

This question is directed to folks who blog but derive no revenue nor do they plan to derive revenue from it. What motivates you to write and publish your writings online?

More context: I've noticed over time from submissions and comments that many people in our community enjoy writing and blogging. Recently, in an article that was trending about retiring early, the author said that now that he is "financially independent", he plans to spend more time writing. I'm curious what non-monetary reasons people have for spending their free time writing and publishing their writings online.

  • by user_235711 on 1/5/22, 11:47 PM

    For me writing is thought exploration and a way to share knowledge, and while I have published some books and am working on others, some of my thoughts do not warrant being included in a book but are still interesting enough to want to share them. That's where the blog comes in, for content that is not quite book-worthy but definitely share-worthy.

    Also, I suppose that an indirect benefit of having a blog as an author (whether you monetize it or not) is that it allows potential readers to experience some of your writings, thoughts, and writing style for free.

  • by MattGaiser on 12/29/21, 3:14 AM

    In your life you learn interesting things and want to share them with people. Isn't that why we are all here?

    One of my first blog posts was this [0] (only really possible as I worked for the government and not some company that might get mad at me). I was brand new to full time dev work and basically had to stumble my way through to becoming productive.

    [0] https://stackoverflow.blog/2020/02/24/how-to-onboard-yoursel...

    After that I had a process and was curious to know if I was right and if people agreed.

    That and there are questions I get asked repeatedly, so I write out a blog post and just forward a link when asked.

  • by clintonb on 12/29/21, 7:08 AM

    I blog to share knowledge. This is akin to contributing to an open source project, but the project is all of human knowledge.

  • by WheelsAtLarge on 12/29/21, 4:22 AM

    We feel that we have the answers to everything so we need to let people know. There is a certain set of people, we, that feel that we have answers to life's problems.

    True or not, it does not matter. We need to let people know the answers and save them from their mistakes.

  • by zaphar on 12/29/21, 1:44 PM

    Writing is how I work through hard problems. If I'm going to think through something and come up with a solution I may as well share the solution with other people. There is very little reason to keep it to myself and setting it up as a potential revenue stream is unlikely to generate any real meaningful income without serious work that I just don't want to do.