The hours leading up to my San Francisco trip were a blur. I spent Wednesday night shopping for some last minute necessities* and whining about not feeling prepared. I believe I began the actual packing process around 10:30 p.m. Note for future travelers: Packing while exhausted is not a good idea. All of my organization training flew out the window as I randomly threw clothes, shoes and hygiene products into my bag. This method requires at least 15 minutes of re-packing in the morning because you A. either forgot something or B. couldn’t close your suitcase. I chose A and B.
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After arriving at the airport and meeting up with Jamie the Adventures of J & J could begin! It’s been a while since I last traveled with somebody. The last 10 or so flights I’ve been on have been solo trips (thank you long-distance relationship). Our flight wasn’t great, but it could have been worse. It was really crowded and it seemed that most of the children on board were conveniently located near our row. I also had the pleasure of sitting near a particularly gassy woman. That was very unpleasant. I’m not used to flights lasting more than two-ish hours. Midway through our flight I had to pee. I tried to hold it until we landed because airplane bathrooms scare me. They’re dirty and smelly and what if I get sucked through the toilet when I flush? Ew. I gave in and ended up waiting in line. I took a deep breath, closed my eyes and went in. I felt super dirty afterward. I wish I could have bathed in hand sanitizer.
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Once we landed, I was hit with a blast of cool air. Thinking it was only the AC, I shrugged it off and continued on my way to baggage claim. Thirty minutes later, bags in tow, we were on our way outside to wait for our ride. That cool air I felt was NOT the AC. It was Oakland. I was completely surprised because I had just left 90-degree weather in Chicago. SF was at least 30 degrees cooler. I began to rethink my wardrobe in my suitcase.
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My friend C picked us up in a hijacked Prius and took us to our hotel. He pointed out various sites on our drive from Oakland to SF. We saw Treasure Island and the Bay Bridge as well as areas that we should avoid. Once at the hotel, I paid $10 to park for 25 minutes while we ran our bags upstairs. Our hotel, The Hotel Carlton, was really adorable from the wall paper to furniture! Our room was on the top floor and we had a pretty great view of the city. There were even balloons, two wine glasses and a bottle of wine waiting for us.**
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The hotel is making an effort to be “green.” They have recycling bins in each room as well as a shampoo, conditioner and shower gel dispenser in the bathroom. They are also equipped with solar panels and is certified as a Green Business by the City of San Francisco. The hotel staff was beyond helpful. In addition to the birthday upgrade and goodies, they were very useful when asking for directions, opinions and assisting us with getting back to Oakland for our return flight. They were very pleasant and welcoming.
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After I changed to more weather-appropriate clothes, C and I set out to cram a day full of site-seeing into four hours. I’m amazed at everything we were able to do. First we went to Fisherman’s Warf for some clam chowder. I have never had it before and was pretty nervous about trying something with clams in it. The sourdough bowl sort of made me excited though. I ended up really liking it. I even recommended that some of the BlogHer gals make a trip to Boudins to try some. From there we drove through Haight Ashbury, Golden Gate Park and saw the Legion of Honor. I was able to get a few great pictures of the Golden Gate Bridge during this trip. Before wrapping up our adventure, we walked along the Golden Gate Bridge stopping every few minutes to take pictures. We didn’t walk the whole thing as the bridge is deceptively smaller when looking at it from a distance. We got about a third of the way through it before the cool winds became too much to bear. I’m glad I was able to experience it though. I also had a great view of Alcatraz, Angel Island and the city.
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On our way back to the hotel C drove me down Lombard Street. Holy hell. I was NOT expecting the hills to be so steep! At the very top I couldn’t see the road in front of our car and was convinced we’d fly off a cliff if we drove forward. Turns out there is a road there, no worries! I could not imagine living on that street with the number of tourists always there walking around taking pictures. It is very beautiful though. The flowers and view of the city are amazing. The houses are pretty spiffy, too!
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Once C dropped me off a the hotel, I went to meet Jamie, Katelin and Vanessa at Lori’s for dinner. Apparently there are two Lori’s on the same street and I went to the wrong one to begin with. Not cool. I ate a very nutritious dinner consisting of a Coke and two scoops of strawberry ice cream and orange sherbet. I’m 24, I’ll eat what I want. From there we went to the Westin St. Francis, where BlogHer was being held, for the Newbie Mixer. Talk about overwhelming! We met up with Jessica and her friend/colleague Theresa and bounced between the Newbie Mixer and the People’s Party downstairs. I also met Sizzle hwo is ridiculously awesome and even more beautiful in person. Be jealous. Bloggy business cards were being handed out left and right as people recognized blog names and finally put faces to them. It was a great experience and the bags full of free swag were a bonus.
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* Necessities include a new dress, shirt, mini deodorant and Cosmopolitan.
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** Stay tuned for two videos about our wine fail.
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See other blogger’s recaps:
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Vanessa
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Katelin
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Jessica
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Jamie
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Live Blogging - Closing Keynote: Living the Truman Show
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Featuring:
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Elisa Camahort Page
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Heather Armstrong
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Stephanie Klein
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Elisa announced that Melissa from Stirrup Queens won this year’s BlogHer Hero Contest.
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Elisa (to Heather and Stephanie): Who were you before you started blogging. What was your life? Who were you at the time? Both of you have changed and evolved.
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Stephanie: “Before I started my blog I was walking around with a spatula in one hand…married to a doctor…working full time in advertising designing websites…in 2004 that’s when I started the blog. Before all of that happened I had a personal website where I would list my sites. It was my virtual resume to show my art.” She included some writing samples.
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Heather: “I am pretty much the same person that I was…an evil manical robot.” Someone said they wanted to pour hydrochloric acid on her to expose the real her. She developed a small space on the web in 2001 and the rest is history. She expected friends she went to college with to read it…not her mother and father.
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Her parents found her two days after 9/11 after writing a mean-spirited post about mormons. Her brother Googled “Dooce” and sent an email to the rest of the family. “He outed me.” He wanted her to remove every mention of his two children on her blog.
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Elisa: Who did you think you were writing for?
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Stephanie: She sent it to some friends because it was easier than sending out mass emails. A co-worker mentioned she should start a blog because it’s “just easier.” She knew people were reading it when an independent newspaper in London called her to say they loved her blog. She’s also a photographer and would put her photos on her blog. People would ask where they could see pictures from a specific event and she would direct them to her blog.
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Elisa: Do you think it’s weird to live and think “this would be a good blog post?”
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Stephanie: “I think that’s common for any kind of artist because you’re trying to remember what you live as your living it. You’re always thinking about how this best translates into a story.” She’s always walking around with a camera because she doesn’t want to miss a moment.
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Heather: John is the number one person she is thinking of when she writes.
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Stephanie: When she was on the cover of NY Times Style section. Her friends would say they loved her, but it made them feel like shit about their friendship. It was weird for her friends to find out these stories she told them are now being told to everybody. It made them feel like their friendship meant less. Now they’re encouraging her to write it on the blog as long as she tells them on the blog.
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Heather: Some friends from high school refuse to read it because they think she’s abandoned the friendships. Back in 2004, she found that she was able to work through what she was feeling better by writing about it. John would come home from work two hours later and say that he didn’t know she was feeling so bad.
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Elisa: He’s a blogger too? Do you ever blog the same stories?
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Heather: “We kind of call dibs on stories.”
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Heather: Blogging changed the way she lived and her outlook on life. She said horrible things about religion, her family and a boss and ended up getting fired and loosing the trust of her family. She ended up taking the blog down because she didn’t like who she was in. “This is not a good idea.” She took a break and decided she didn’t want to put that back into the world. It changed the way she wrote about people on her website. “I don’t want people to dread the fact that I wrote about them…”
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Stephanie: I get a lot of someone telling a story saying “Don’t you dare write about this on your blog!” Her family was really supportive and loved her blog. Her ex-mother-in-law and husband might not agree, but her immediate family was very supportive.
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Elisa: Do you feel like your style has changed because of your life changes?
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Stephanie: “I don’t think my style has changed, my life has changed. It has always been very raw, very honest and very real of everything I was going through. Your voice will change and your life will change.” Her life has changed drastically, but it’s all about being very real and honest about what you’re going through.
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Elisa: As you change your blog can serve your life.
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Stephanie: People try to pigeon-hole you. Because you write about one thing, you’re suddenly a body image writer or mommy blogger. Just be yourself.
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Elisa: BlogHer performed a survey about what you would blog about if you could only choose one thing. The most popular response was “my life.”
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Heather: People would approach her in a grocery store and tell her it’s so weird that they know everything about her. But they don’t. There is a filter in her head. “Ninety-five percent of my life is not blogged about.”
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Elisa: The character “Heather” on your blog is only a part of the person.
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Stephanie: “People definitely believe that they know everything about me.” They know you, but they don’t know what you’re going through.
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Elisa: People don’t think of you as a real live person with feelings who can get hurt.
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Heather: Just because she puts things out there doesn’t mean she isn’t a sensitive type who repeatedly gets her feelings hurt.
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Audience Member: Asked about a rumor where Heather ran over negative comments.
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Heather: She’s printed out nasty comments and ran over them with her car per a request..
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AM: Regarding her recent Oprah diet, she was reading through the comments and a lot of women were “so glad you went on the diet, now we can to.” “It’s like they’re putting you in a position of an authority. How do you deal with that, does it stress you out? Do you feel responsible? How do you move beyond it?”
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Heather: You don’t move beyond it. She talks to her husband about her stress. It took her a couple of days to read the comments and understand. It’s constantly changing and evolving things. Sometimes she needs to walk away from the comments.
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Elisa: Do you ever feel that people pay a little too close attention to what you do?
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Stephanie: (Sarcastically) Noooo. It won’t hurt her feelings if they say she has awful hair. Anything that hurts or stings can make us stronger. She believes that our enemies are our best teachers because she uses it as a learning experience.
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AM: If you were to shut your blogs down today, do you think you’d go through some sort of withdrawal?
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Heather: “For me to just stop would be a bit of a lifestyle change.” She’d have to get a ‘real job’ outside of home. She would probably sleep for three weeks and experience a tiny bit of euphoria. It can be very stressful and maintaining a website. Sometimes she will get an email or message if she misses a day asking her why she’s not writing because it’s her job.
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Stephanie: She would miss the commenters and the support. She’s not just writing blogs, she’s writing books and memoirs and TV. But it’s not the same feedback. Being able to vent to people who don’t know you personally is helpful. Hearing another point of view on it is amazing.
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AM named Jill: Are you doing it for yourself or for the readers? How do you balance what drives your writing?
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Stephanie: She’s done both. Sometimes she won’t post something if she knows people can’t relate to it. Sometimes she feels that she just needs to do it for her. In the beginning it was just for her, but once you know you have an audience reading, you start to care more.
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Heather: Feels like she has a special relationship with her readers. Every decision she makes on her website is made with her audience online. (What are their best interests?) She believe her audience is a part of what saved her life. She first writes for herself because there is nothing quite like the feeling of knowing exactly what you’re going to write about and you can see the post in the head and loving it. The fact that she still has those days every week that is what keeps her going. If she ever stopped feeling that way, she wouldn’t do it. She’s also keeping a record of her life for her daughter. She gets a whole picture of her childhood.
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Elisa: “I think blogs are creating a beautiful cultural record for all of our children”
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AM: Do you read every comment? Do you notice regular readers? How does it feel when you do a post that maybe gets 100 comments vs. 10? Does that mean anything to you?
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Heather: The only entry she hasn’t read every single comment on was the one where she gave away Wii Fits. But every other entry and email she reads. She considers it a part of her job. Her audience was crucial in saving her life. She wants to have an organic relationship with her readers.
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Elisa: How do you manage the guilt of not responding to emails and comments?
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Stephanie: You can’t. There’s not enough time in the day to respond to even your family and friends. She reads every single comment, but she doesn’t have the time to write back to everyone.
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Heather: A lot of people in her life want her to install an automatic response for her emails. She can’t promise you will hear back from her, but she guarantees she reads everything. She couldn’t live her life if she responded to everything.
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AM: Thinks Heather was a different person at BlogHer 06. How do you reconcile who you are in your private life and who you are publicly?
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Heather: A lot of people expect her to be much more abrasive. In general she’s a polite, friendly southern woman. They expect a raw and unfiltered person, but in her head she feels like the blog is an extension to her personality. She will tell you anything about her. There really isn’t a line.
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Stephanie: She believes she’s the same person online and in person. A lot of people say she sounds a lot sweeter and girly in person. She’s not a big laugher, where as people online think she’s funny and has a great sense of humor. Overall she thinks she is who she writes about.
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AM: When you get negative feedback, it’s good to take a second to pause and creating something positive out of it. Do you have to take that pause for yourself? Do you have a conscious way to work through the negativity and not take it to heart?
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Stephanie: “Yes it’s called hitting the delete button. You don’t have to respond to everything.” She’s had spin-off sites come out and sites built for hating her. She’s never responded to any of it. It’s not her style. Come at them with kindness…
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Heather: She doesn’t respond to any hate mail. She collects it in a folder and will eventually publish a book. Every 2-3 months she’ll do a hate mail post so people can see what happens when people stop being nice and start getting real.
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AM: Do you delete those comments? If not, why do you leave them there? The rest of us would never ever read anything damaging to you.
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Heather: If they’re toward her audience, friends or family, she will delete them.
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Stephanie: It depends on my mood. Sometimes she doesn’t think much about it and will delete. Sometimes other people might have something to say about it and she’ll leave it out there. She gets a lot of honest feedback via email rather than in comments sometimes.
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AM: Are you surprised which posts generate more commentary?
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Heather: No. Sometimes she’s surprised because she didn’t know people would be so upset about her diet.
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Stephanie: Doesn’t think it matters a lot about the number of comments on a particular post. You never know how one thing you write will affect one person. Don’t let the popularity of some post dictate future posts.
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AM: Assuming you add blogs to your readers, what makes you add them?
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Elisa: Most of the blogs she adds are relevant to BlogHer.
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Stephanie: She has a lot of blogs that she doesn’t have time to read. What gets her to add them is topical. One week it’s technology, another its scrapbooking. It goes by the mood she’s in that day to read.
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Heather: If someone has created or writing about characters in way that makes her really care about them. When she finds that tug at her, she’ll add them immediately.
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Elisa: That indicates we’re all characters to each other in a way.
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AM: When you write about women and care about women, it is very threatening to our culture. We need to support each other and remember that this is not something people will like. We are pushing the envelope.
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Audience applauds.
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AM Accidentally Jewish: If you could make one rule for the internet, what would it be?
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Heather: You can only post anonymously if you’re blowing a whistle on a horrible government program.
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Elisa: What percentage of hate comments you get is anonymous?
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Heather: 60-70.
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Stephanie: 90% She’s a no rules kind of girl. Do onto others as you would want to you. That doesn’t apply to her husband. If he started a blog, she would die.
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AM: Is it this medium that’s making us extreme or the audience’s reaction? Blogging brings out all ends of the spectrum and not a whole lot in the middle.
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Stephanie: “Blogging gives people a voice. Sometimes its a voice we don’t necessarily want to hear.” It’s a vehicle. We’re so accessible as bloggers, people don’t have to think twice about shooting off an email. We will hear about it. It is amplified about it. But if someone’s doing it in a book or in the press, you won’t hear as much backlash about it as you do in blogs.
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Heather: People go to great lengths to leave anonymous comments. It’s an opportunity for their ego to just crap all over something. There is something fulfilling about that for them because they know she will read it. They know they will get her eyeballs because of the blog.
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Elisa: She doesn’t think the blogosphere creates this type of person, but there is an element of amplification. It’s the beauty of the blogosphere. You get so much support and love, but it can be dark at times.
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AM: What do you say to people when they question what you write about? Many ask if you’re missing something in your life so you feel the need to blog about it.
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Stephanie: Nothing is missing in her life, but sometimes she just wants to capture everything that is happening in her life.
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AM: How many hours a day do you spend on your blog?
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Heather: Depending on what product she has going on inside of her blog, it can reach 10-12 hours a day. She’s worked harder at this blog than any other blog in her life. Are you dedicated to working your ass off? It is way more than a full time job.
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Stephanie: She doesn’t blog everyday, but she’ll post everyday. She will dedicate days for only blog material and store it to go live at another time and she’ll spend other days working only on a book or TV show. She can’t do everything in one day. She found herself blogging on cocktail napkins because you never know where something will come up that you want to say/remember.
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Today is Heather’s birthday. Elisa asked everyone who celebrated a birthday this weekend at BlogHer to come up to the stage and the audience sang “Happy Birthday.”

This BlogHer ‘08 session is part of the “Who We Are” break-out session entitled “‘Coming Out’ via Blog.
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Panelists include:
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Susan Mernit
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Stephanie Quilao
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JenB
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Jess Howard
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Sarah Dopp (also at Genderfork)
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Susan welcomes everyone and explains that “coming out” refers to people sharing things that are private on their blogs.
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Her reaction to the sessions here have been mixed. Some have been slow and some are great and more face paced. She wants this session to be more interactive and plans to open it up to the audience to share experiences. She encourages everyone to think of this as a safe space. People are exposing themselves and being vulnerable without a computer screen in front of them.
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Nobody shares everything, there are things we all hold back.
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Stephanie blogs about body image and discusses her own issues with bulimia. She is here because her blog is about 3 years old, but has become a top blog in the body image area. Last fall she had a relapse. Behind the scenes, she was doing something contradictory to her message. People were looking to her for inspiration and to be a role model. In Jan. she came out to her readers and tell them about her relapse. Today she will share how they reacted and the thought process behind her decision to “come out.”
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Sarah has two public blogs. (Above) Genderfork was created under a pseudo-name. Later she came out on her public blog as queer because she was very proud of her blog. “Queer means I’m not straight and I’m not a lesbian, I’m somewhere in between.” Trying to navigate the world with her personal identity known is a challenge.
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JenB doesn’t use last name. Personal blog. Will be talking about infertility and her struggles with mental help. She has things that many people don’t talk about, but that she would like to talk about. Her marriage is off limits for her husband’s privacy.
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Jess writes about her depression and hospitalization. More recently a suicide attempt and her survival. (Audience applauds her)
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Susan asks the panelists to talk about their decision to share things. Did they share it first on the blog and then family or the other way around?
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Sarah: “That’s funny.” She put a post on her blog titled “Queer” and realized she didn’t tell her family yet. She immediately sent out an email to her family telling them to read it and helped explain it to her family.
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JenB: Initially she didn’t feel comfortable talking about it with her friends. If she continued to talk about it, it wouldn’t be warranted. Her blog became a safe place with a big audience to get feed back. Her blog began in 2002 and since then she’s noticed she edits it more because IRL friends and blog friends are now the same to her. She’s more concerned about what they think because blog friends are REAL friends now. She’s getting a lot of support and feels less judged by the blogging community. She has to edit for her family more. She told them that BlogHer was a “Lady’s Writing Conference.”
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Jess: She tries to keep her family and people in her home town away from her blog. She would go to their house and get their IP address so she could block them from her blog. Talking about it online is the only place she feels safe. Immediate face-to-face judgment was hard to handle.
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Stephanie: Bulimia was not a secret to her readers. She talks about the messy middle. In magazines you see someone who is overweight and sad and then they jump to being thin and happy. You don’t see the hard part. She wants to be authentic and show the messy middle. She’s nervous because she used her full name in her blog and in a time where everyone Googles everyone, it was scary. Her blog is her life. She’s talked about date rape and bulimia. You write about your life and share your secrets, but you’re giving people hope as well.
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Susan to audience: How did you come out about something sensitive ….
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Karen, Notes To Self: Last year husband & her faced foreclosure. Waiting for someone to cut off her lights. Both freelancers. Through tears, she wrote where she was and what she was going through. It was very naked, but the support she received from her community was “phenomenal.”
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Audience member: Sex-topic day. She was discussing rape and thought she’d receive amazingly supporting comments, but didn’t receive much. She put herself out there and wanted someone to tell her it was okay. This experience made her less transparent and decided not to share more intimate stories.
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Amy, Contentious: There is a ripple effect. People who are having the same issues don’t necessarily respond. Writes a business blog, but spoke about her personal life and that she’s polyamorous… Was told people wouldn’t think she was credible any longer. “If you think people are going to judge you about it, they don’t. They don’t care that much. It may not be as big of a risk as you think it is.”
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Audience member: Is starting a blog and wants to talk about eating disorders, date rape, etc. Her bosses know her blog and she’s worried about how to act in the office. How do you decide what to share and when?
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Sarah: She’s an independent contractor and was worried it would negatively impact her job. She did it in a way that was contained and didn’t throw it in anyone’s face. Because of that, more people are backing her because her voice is being heard in a way they want theirs heard.
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Stephanie: There’s a difference between being sensational and showing how you’re healing. “This is what happened, this is what I’m doing…has anyone else been in the situation?” Communicate that it’s a healing process because we’ve all been through a situation like that. That’s what inspires people to come back to read you.
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Susan: Anything you share, positive or negative, will have consequence. People will form opinions about you. Ask yourself why are you sharing this? What is the point? Own the consequences. She heard Amy say she was polyamorous and could relate. She was going through a difficult divorce at the time and didn’t want to write about her personal life because it would affect her job. Once she left her company, she was able to discuss her personal life a bit more and tell people she’s in an open-relationship. People were finding her and assuming that she meant indiscriminate and were trying to flirt with her instead of relate to her. That’s a good example of how she experienced good and bad consequences.
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Stephanie: Is newly single and began dabbling in dating. She’s hesitant to tell them what she does because he will read about her bulimia and date rape stories. They haven’t gotten to know each other yet, it’s only the first date. This could be very awkward.
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Jess: “I don’t have a thought process, I’m just impulsive when it comes to putting things out there.” There are things she doesn’t write about and doesn’t worry about it. Consequences have been varied. She lives in a small neighborhood and has been ostracized from her community because of her blog. The consequences are a learning experience for her and she enjoys it.
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JenB: (In reference to the audience member’s question about writing a blog her bosses know the URL for) She would start an anonymous blog because it was the only way she could feel like she could be uncensored and share everything without consequence.
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Audience member: What has your experience been with people in your life responding to what you’ve written?
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Stephanie: With her, the bulimia has been going on for years so her family were familiar. With her friends it was different. Males were a bit more accepting where as the females were kind of iffy - possibly because of their own issues. One friend distanced herself after finding out. Stephanie is free and open to talking about it and it makes others uncomfortable because maybe you’ve stirred something up in them that they can’t deal with. Some people will distance themselves because of that.
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Susan: Are there people in your life that telling things on your blog has it brought them closer or pushed them away?
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Sarah: She keeps a locked LiveJournal for her messy personal life stories. She handpicks her audience and strangers cannot stumble upon it. She has very different relationships in her life between her blogs. LiveJournal users get to know her in a very intimate way that she’d never tell them in person. Some people will come up to her and respond to a post she wrote three weeks ago.
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JenB: Her in the city friends read her blog, but don’t comment or say much about what she wrote. She gets treated neutrally. She wonders why they haven’t checked in on her.
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Audience member: Maybe because they view it as your diary and respect that. She’ll receive comments from strangers, but not a lot of check-in from her friends.
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Susan: One of the things everyone would agree on is often when you do post personal blogs, you get an incredible community of people you don’t know. She remembers when she got divorced she started a private blog and had 5-6 people commenting who stayed for 2 years. The other side is the whole idea of what if you do have something you want to reveal. What kind of support or preparation do you want to go through to get it out if it’s not fueled by emotion. How do you manage that? What makes you decide to take that step? What pushes someone into that moment saying “we’re going to talk about this.”
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Susan asks audience members to share experience about taking steps…
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Audience member: Just started her blog. Only child from divorced family. Dad has a second family. Doesn’t have a good relationship with step parents. How do you talk about something that is so defining to who you are, while respecting the fact that they have a family who they’ve been very good to? The last thing she wants to do is expose her siblings parents in a bad light because she knows how that feels. Knowing that even if you’ve portrayed something neutral could be taken offensively. How do you share a very strong point of view?
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Audience member: Add a disclaimer to your site. “FYI This is what I’m talking about, I love my family, etc., etc.” She’s in HR and people ask her questions that are legal in nature and will refer to her disclaimer before she gives advice.
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Jess: “If you’re going to talk about your family, you’re in for a potential world of hurt.” She wrote about her family and it had horrible consequences. She’d love to write about things that happened in her childhood that made her who she is today, but that is one of her boundaries.
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JenB: Unless they don’t read it.
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Susan: A challenge with blogging is that you have to assume that some day someone might find it and you will be linked to it. Be realistic and know that some day, if this comes out, you are not completely destroyed.
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Audience member, from Recovering Straight Girl: Didn’t use any personal information or real names and her mother and ex husband found it along with a girl in HS found it. She eventually gave up and stopped trying to hide. But knowing that certain people are reading it, she thinks more before writing. She’s still very authentic, but hesitant.
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Audience member: Even when you’re talking in generalities and you’ve disguised people, if they’re in your life, they will think it’s about them. She wrote about someone and many people thought she was talking about them.
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Audience member: From a large company point of view, she started her first blog off of Microsoft Portal. She’d go from conference to conference and only talked about technology. The one time she did, someone called Microsoft trying to access to their corp net pretending to be her. She stopped posting there because of that. It was very scary. She started a new one, but doesn’t talk about anything personal because she is a part of a bigger company. She lives vicariously through other bloggers since she can’t put anything personal about herself on a blog.
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Susan: (to the audience) What is most useful to you? What do you want to know? What else do you want to get out of this session? What do you want to share?
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Maria: Doesn’t share much personal information. Even when she writes things that don’t have to do with her, people still get the wrong impression. If she does talk about her family, she will talk to them first and get their permission to discuss it on her blog. If she doesn’t get their okay, then it’s not okay for her to discuss.
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Lisa: She doesn’t say anything about anyone on her blog that she wouldn’t say to a stranger at a bus stop. She moved from having a personal paper journal to a blog and realized she wasted a lot of time bitching about other people in her diary. Her blog is about her and her personal business.
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Audience member: This is an imperfect medium in certain ways. Lives are imperfect. It won’t be an easy place to talk about our feelings and experiences in a way that won’t hurt anybody. “In order to talk about difficult things, we have to take the risk. It’s not a risk-free environment.”
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Susan: What have you learned that you can teach everyone in this room from the moment you started to speak about your topic, to today.
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Sarah: “I’m not the only queer person in the world.” She used Twitter to find people who relate to her and within 3 days she had about 50 people in her “posse.” There are people like her and make her feel stronger. Speaking her truth helped her find out she was not alone. “If you can bear the risk, the rewards can be great.”
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Jess: The lesson she’s learned is that being honest and proud of who you are is an amazing experience. You’re not alone and honesty is a really powerful tool.
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Steph: A lot of her readers can relate to her. Working in PR is difficult because you are the perfect face of the company. To come out and say that it’s tiring being perfect was a big relief. “It’s like taking off pantyhose and being able to breathe!” People like you more when you’re yourself. Be real. When you meet someone who is authentic, it’s refreshing.
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JenB: It’s cyclical where it is less icky. She wants to be a success story some days, but that’s not how it’s gone. Some days are good and some are shitty. She wants to be the sitcom where in the beginning she was feeling bad, then she’d learn a lesson and overcome difficulty and in the end, she was happy. For most people that’s not how it works. She’s having trouble getting the happy ending.
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Audience member to JenB: Has it kept you from sharing?
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JenB: “Yes, because I’m worried people will get tired of hearing about me trying to find the right medication still, etc.” She knows that she’s receiving a lot of positive reinforcement from her readers about her setbacks. She did have a good experience saying more and getting more feedback, but she wants a better ending.
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Audience: Is having an audience affecting your progress?
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JenB: “No, I don’t think so. I think it’s all on me. I am responsible for the icky middle.” She has a support system.
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Susan: “One thing about transparency is that sometimes you are exposing failure where you didn’t mean to. What is the value of choosing transparency? It makes us vulnerable to both criticism and pity at times….”
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Shuna, from Eggbeater: to Jess - “Ignore me if i start crying.” She survived domestic violence situation many years ago….in a queer relationship…it does happen. Went to closed domestic violence sessions and one thing she realized was “that which I have already exposed and know is there and I’m not hiding it…the person who is interested in holding that against me no longer has the power.” She wouldn’t stop writing things in order to get a job because she would probably get fired anyway because this is who she is.
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Audience: For Stephanie and others who blog about ED issues. Is it ever triggering for you to write about it? Does writing about depression take you to a darker place?
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Stephanie: Evolved her blog. Her blog is about healing. She starts doing research and ventures into ED issues and it’s really dark. It does trigger her sometimes. When Documentary Thin came out, she couldn’t watch it because of the triggers. She won’t blog about what she’s doing because there are people looking for ED tips to maintain the lifestyle. She wants to maintain the message of healing and not feeling alone.
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JenB: “I wish the things I talked about would come to an end.” We’re not alone. One of her most popular posts was when she talked about “shitting her pants.” All of a sudden everyone has or does shit their pants. She felt commonality about that and felt it was heartfelt.
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Jess: She is getting better, but writing about the same things is that the journey continues. She’s moving forward.
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Sarah: Expects her blog to evolve with her.

This BlogHer ‘08 session is part of the “What We Do” break-out sessions entitled DIY Content Syndication and Promotion. It features panelists:
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Anne-Marie Nichols, The Write Spot
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Gwen Bell, Gwenbell.com
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Esther Brady aka Faintstarlite
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To kick off the session, Kristen took a quick survey to see how many people had a blog, wanted a blog, used social networking sites or wanted to learn more about social networking sites and building more traffic.
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Many audience members wanted to learn how to incorporate networking tools along with live-streaming, video and audio into their blogs. Learning how to choose which items to syndicate and how to manage all of the different accounts is a big part of this session.
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First question:
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Kristen: Talk about which social media tools bloggers should use to drive traffic to their sites. Should they use social bookmarks like Digg and Kirtsy?
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Anne-Marie: She recommends to use them, but don’t just “digg” your own stuff. The Point isn’t to get traffic/exposure for only yourself, but for others as well. Backlinks are very important. This shows that people are linking to you because they find something about your blog particularly interesting. Google looks at who views your content. The higher your rank, the higher you show up in a search. If people find you more while not necessarily looking for a blog to read, it speaks well of your content.
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Building a community is very important. Find people who can promote your content as well as you promoting theirs. Job the system. “Why not help yourself promote yourself while helping others?” StumbleUpon is great for creating a lot of traffic. It allows you to download a tool bar, which makes it easy to give a site your viewing a thumbs up or thumbs down. One downside to StumbleUpon is that it seems to work for a while, but all of a sudden the traffic stops. This may be a good place to take a break from that site and explore others. Find smaller sites. Find people who are in your niche. Make a community. Link love is a great traffic tool. “If you do nice stuff for people, hopefully it will come back to you.”
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Esther was a video blogger who was discovered by CNN/Weight Watchers.
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Kristen: Give us a quick rundown of video syndications you use and how you choose your content.
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Esther: I have tried about two dozen different platforms. After a trial-and-error process, she has compiled a top four.
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1. YouTube. It is a popular site that is great for traffic. Even if you’re going to host your video some where else, post it on YouTube.
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2. Blip.TV is great for episodic content. There is a lot of freedom unlike YouTube. TOS is very laidback and liberal. YouTube can pull your content if a complaint is filed against you. It doesn’t need to be proven.
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3. Brightcove is very customizable. There is a lot of control over the visual aspects of the page. It is also very good for search engines. A downside is that you don’t get any revenue sharing using the free version and the paid version is very expensive.
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4. Vimeo.com is more for people who are interested in high-quality videos. There is HD-streaming quality. People who really care about visuals will choose this site.
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Kristen: Do you have any experience with video live streaming?
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Esther: Only a little experience. I’m not really the best person to ask about this.
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Audience member asked if she had opinions on Vidler.
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Esther: I don’t get many comments or views on some of the newer sites. I like YouTube because of the video responses. Video responses and tags are really important to build a community.
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Kristen: (Question for Gwen Bell) There are a lot of tools that people use to syndicate content online. Where should someone who is new to using a tool start and what are the rules of engagement?
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Gwen: I’ll start with Twitter. It’s a matter of jumping into and becoming part of the conversation. Engage in conversation with the readers of your blog or users of your product. Zappos.com and JetBlue did this successfully. Also be sure to get comfortable with the jargon.
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Gwen is an editor for Kirtsy. She described it as “Digg for chicks.” It is a “content-driven recommendation engine.” People “kirtsy” stories they like or products they’ve used. It’s a way to share things you love with other women.
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Kristen mentions that depending on your area, there may be another site specifically created for what you’re writing about. Anne-Marie reiterates that point and how it’s beneficial to community building. Finding people who are passionate about a certain topic will provide great traffic.
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Audience member asks Gwen’s opinion on Plurk vs. Twitter.
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Gwen: “I have spent two days of my life on Plurk and it was a black hole. I couldn’t keep up.” Plurk was more of a cute toy than a tool. Twitter streams better. Plurk is not a networking tool or community building tool like Twitter is.
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Audience member: In addition to submitting our own content, how do we use Kirtsy to get followers?
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Anne-Marie uses web 2.0 submitter. It helps to copy your URL, title, description and tags. It will log in on various sites you’re a member of. She likes Kirtsy because it’s women and mom-based. Her advice is to experiment. Find a tool that works for you. It can be very time consuming and you need to decide if it’s worth it. Is the site meeting your goals for your RSS, readership, traffic, etc?
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Audience member: What about spending time on the site voting other people’s contents?
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Anne-Marie: Look like a real person. Vote on other’s posts, backlink, etc. Spend time getting to know their content.
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Gwen: I am not into spam. I would rather use a few tools very well and effectively instead of using tons of sites and seeing fewer results. (She uses six sites max.)
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Audience member: Feels like she needs to be in a remedial class because none of this is making sense. What would be recommended if she said she wanted more people to find her site. She’s been on various networking sites and didn’t like it. What can she do to gain more readership and traffic without investing a lot of time?
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Anne-Marie: Go to BlogHer.com and submit stuff there. Try MyBlogLog. It will help build community and doesn’t require a lot of time either.
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Kristen: Analyze where traffic is coming from and focus on what is already working. Try Google Analytics or a similar site. There isn’t one tool that will work for everyone. It depends on the content, how active you are (how frequent you post) and how often you comment. Build on what’s working…
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Audience member: What if you’re getting NO traffic - you’re just starting out?
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Panelists: Comment and write great content. Use other sites and take advantage of it. Post on Flickr or Twitter as well as your blog.
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Kristen: Comments are important as well are Trackbacks. They’re great because you’re linking to someone’s blog, which helps them get traffic. Often times you will show up on their blog and that will send people to yours. They’re effective because you’re reaching people who are already interested in that content.
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Esther: For video blogging, find someone to collaborate with who is already making videos and posting them. Ask a blogger to post the HTML of your video blog on their blog. Tagging is important. Find a video that is similar to yours. Copy their tags and add on. That way when people find that video, yours will show up near it.
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Audience member: How much time would you recommend that I interact with my readers. How do I keep people on my site happy? Any recommendations for frequency of posting and responding to comments?
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Anne-Marie: There are too many blogs and not a lot of time. I want to teach new bloggers to think about goals they want to set for themselves so they don’t get burnt out. The more frequent you can update, the better. Try to at least say “thank you for stopping by.” Time is needed. Set boundaries for yourself and decide when it is best for you to respond.
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Esther: I have 17,000 friends on Myspace. It is important to them to respond promptly so people know that I value their readership. It creates a sense of community and encourages them to participate more.
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Audience member: I have tried various methods for increasing readership and they have worked. A lot of the traffic is from juvenile wack-jobs.” Wants major feedback from people about a topic but hates spending a lot of time to delete stupid comments.
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Anne-Marie: Similar to marketing, if you cast a wide net you will catch a lot of people. Some you might not like. Choose a smaller net and hope for quality, not quantity.
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Audience member: Her single biggest source of quality traffic has been from Twitter because she has relationships with people on there. Now is the best time to join because you can connect with people from the conference.
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Gwen: You can perform a search for BlogHer 08 at search.twitter.com and find everyone who has twittered about BlogHer. Also track your own name and see who is following you.
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Audience member: How do you feel about giveaways?
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Gwen: “People love free stuff.”
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Audience member: If products fit your audience, contact a PR rep on the website and find out if they’d be interested in your review.
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Esther: If you’re enthusiastic about a brand, send the link of your review to the company. Don’t be afraid to reach out. (This is how she began video blogging for Weight Watchers.)
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Audience member with New Media Strategies: Companies look for your level of passion and interest because they look at you as influencers.
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Audience member: I read nearly 100 blogs a day through a reader. I don’t feel like I’m helping them. What blog readers are more effective to reward those I follow?
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Anne-Marie: You’re in their RSS readership. You are helping them. Make an effort to go to their site and comment live. Get out of your reader.
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Kristen: I use Friendfeed. I hated it at first, but as more people joined, I became more interested. What Friendfeed does is combine all of your social networking sites into one place. People can follow you from one place.
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Do some tracking to see what is being said about your blog in the blogosphere. The reason it is important to see what people are saying is because it gives you a chance to create relationships. Experiment with Twitter Search, Friendfeed and Google Blog Search.
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Audience member: What do you recommend for posting content to BlogHer?
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Anne-Marie: Post an excerpt of a blog post and link back to your blog for the rest.
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Audience member (who doesn’t use Twitter): Why do you like Twitter?
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Kristen: That’s a big question. Does anybody have an answer?
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Audience member: What makes it so great is that you have all of these wonderful conversations going on and you can jump in the middle. You’re talking to people and the people following them then see your stream. They eventually follow you and end up checking out your blog. It is a giant social community.
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The session ends and there are still more questions. Anne-Marie and Esther will be at the unconference on Sunday. Gwen recommends to follow her on Twitter and she’ll answer your questions there.

What to expect while I’m gone:
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At least one drunk post.
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Tweets from two very excited travelers.
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Three live blogs from BlogHer sessions.
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Guest blogs from four amazingly awesome bloggers.
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No less than five “super fuck yeahs” from yours truly.
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By this time tomorrow I will be sitting next to Jamie on a plane on our way to San Francisco for BlogHer ‘08. I’m really excited to see our hotel because J surprised me and had our room upgraded for my birthday. Hot damn! Throw some free wine into the mix and you’ll find two VERY happy travelers wandering around SF.
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Since I am live blogging you might see two or three posts pop up on Friday or Saturday. I am linking from my blog and not directly from BlogHer’s so read, ignore, do what you will with them! Be sure to watch out for the guest blogs though. Those you surely don’t want to miss.
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What I’m live blogging:
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- What We Do: DIY Content Syndication and Promotion
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- Who We Are: “Coming Out” via Blog (revealing personal issues to your blog community)
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- Closing Keynote: Living the Truman Show with Heather Armstrong & Stephanie Klein
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What I’m looking forward to:
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- 20SB meet-up
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- Chicago bloggers meet-up
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- What We Do: Writing Workshop
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- How We Communicate: Building Traffic via Content and Community
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- Who We Are: Can You Take Back Naked Blogging?
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- What We Do: Blog to Book Redux
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Sunday will be our free day as we didn’t sign up for that day of the “un-conference.” I’d love to see Alcatraz, but I read that it’s a 2.5 hour-ish tour. Totally worth it, yes, but feasible? Eh. We’ll see.
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If you had a few hours to kill in San Francisco, what would you do?