Blogging Birmingham update

Okay, time for an update, for reasons that will become apparent.

Before that, though, I should give credit to another inspiration for this Brum Blog thing which didn’t really strike me until I’ll started – Dirk Deppy’s Journalista comics blog. Obviously the subject matter is completely different but I really like the way he structures each day’s post into a little magazine that sucks in the links but keeps a sense of personality. (The massive events listing at the end of every single post I’m not so keen on but you can’t have everything.) So, credit where due.

Two days in and I’ve hit a drought – there ain’t nothing of interest to report today. This isn’t too surprising since I’m doing this completely from the computer and not generating any news myself. The first two posts had the benefit of being able to go back and cherry pick the past. Now I’ve done that I’m just waiting for something new to come along. Given that my reasons for starting this enterprise was the paucity of online information for Birmingham and given that I’m trawling my usual hunting grounds it was bound to happen.

But all is not lost. While the actual content of those two posts wasn’t exactly mind blowing I’m pleased with the methodology used for the Edwards blog roundup, the “photo of the day” was a nice touch and while the Mark McGowan story annoyingly found itself everywhere for a short while I feel I did add a bit of value to the piece by drawing attention to his previous work. Otherwise the second post did feel a bit like newsfilter rather than original blogging and I’m not so happy about that. A bit of news relaying is good but too much and you just become the same as everyone else, regurgitating the same old stuff.

Currently I think there’s enough online resources to power a Journalista style post about Birmingham once a week, maybe twice at a push, which has the benefit of allowing time for some deeper research and reflection. Otherwise I’ll start regurgitating the Google News feed and nobody wants that.

Actually, a brief word about that feed. While I’m sure it could be fine tuned (and any tips would be welcome) I’m currently monitoring any UK news items that mention Birmingham but don’t have the words crime, stabbed, blues, alabama, death, murder, sport or football and even then it’s a very depressing read with far too much sport. Footie aside (I just have no interest in it whatsoever so there’s no point it clogging up my feed) I’ve often been perplexed by people’s negative attitude towards the city compared to my generally positive outlook (people look at me odd when I say I’ve walked home through Digbeth at 2am for example), but then I never consume local news and rarely watch or listen to anything other than Radio 4. If your only source of news came from the Birmingham Post and Mail group you’d think you were living in a hell hole, albeit one very keen on football. This is not my city. Still, it has to be parsed.

The football thing is also mildly interesting in that most articles about the sport don’t mention its name (thus making it impossible to completely filter out). It’s assumed that you know who the players and teams are and why what they do is important. I guess this is reasonable since most of these articles will live in the sports section of the paper but on a jumbled up news feed it’s like getting reports from an alien civilization.

(Note to self – add “paedophile” to that blacklist…)

So, in summary, bedroom blogging about Birmingham has its limits, at least until a decent blogosphere develops for the city. That’s actually one of my aims for this project – that along with the few others I’m aware of who are thinking along these lines we might encourage more to join us. That would certainly fulfill the Community criteria.

As for me, I’m now thinking of other ways to fill the blog and that’s going to involve getting off my arse and out there in the city. Which isn’t a problem!

In the mean time, any recommendations of other places to look for regular local information, be they blogs or council stuff or whatever, please leave a comment or email me.