Final thoughts

My friend, a long-time Grateful Dead fan, frequently quotes the phrase "What a long, strange trip it's been," the title of the band's 1977 best-of album, when wrapping up something. It seems fitting then, that I invoke it as I write the final post of this blog.

Personally, some of the most difficult challenges of blogging was worrying about inserting too much of myself into the posts. Especially given that the topic was both personal and broad. The tough job market affects not only me, but from the last count of the unemployed, more than 15 million Americans. I wasn't always comfortable griping about my job search when I knew that there were Moms and Dads out there who have been out of work for six months or more and had families to take care of and bills to pay. I preferred linking to articles and then commenting about what was said in them, and I was wary of turning my blog into a Live Journal-esque collection of whining and complaining. In the end, I realized the personal touches are what sets blogs a part from one another. As one of the few people I know without a personal blog of his own, I'm not sure if I'll have the time to keep up with one. I realize that for a blog to be successful, it requires constant updating, at least 5 times per day on the short end. For me to start up a blog again, I want to be sure that I have the time to truly commit to it.

This probably sounds a little strange to admit, but I have not always been a huge fan of blogging, or bloggers in general. I say strange, because as a member of Generation Y, the Internet is supposedly the center of my universe. But unlike most of my peers, I haven't always been the most computer-savvy. I suppose my aversion to blogging was two-fold. Growing up, my computer expertise was limited and my family wasn't, and still isn't the biggest fans of the Internet. And as a budding journalist in school, learning about objectivity, I felt weirdly threatened. I felt that blogs blurred the line between opinion and straight news reporting, and that went against the basic ideals of journalistic integrity. And what about paying for reporting in the first place? In the world of bloggers, anybody can technically call themselves a "journalist." Where would my presumed future profession fit in this changing media landscape?

Now, with blogs like Talking Points Memo, who often conduct original reporting but unabashedly skews to the political left, I see that their place in journalism is more important than ever. While I have a feeling I will always be a loyal follower of mainstream media publications like the New York Times, I frequently check blogs like the Daily Kos, which covers political news out of Washington, to keep myself informed. Citizen reporting and commentary can catch what some of the big guys have missed, and I know that while journalism is going through a difficult transition, I'd like to think that with more and more people opening their eyes and ears to the world around them, the better this world will be. In a strange parallel, news consumption is actually at an all-time high, even as newspaper and magazine circulation is decreasing rapidly.

I'll be graduating in a few short weeks, and I hope to move to New York City in the coming months. I unfortunately don't have a job (yet), but I'm applying every day and keeping my head up. At this point, I full expect to move there solo, so I may be compelled to share how everything is going with family and friends. And, based on my experiences in this class, that could take shape in a new blog.