In the Australian Local & Family History Bloggers Group on Facebook earlier this week Australian geneablogger Anne Young shared an article from JSTOR Daily “The rise and fall of the blog”.
I don’t think geneablogging is dead. I think that more people are dipping their toes into geneablogging waters and finding that it does not suit their style. Those committed to geneablogging are still around although they may be be blogging as often as they once did. In the ensuing conversation Anne asked me “Jill didn’t you keep some statistics about whether blogs you followed were still active?"
In January last year I wrote about the blogs on the 2013 list and reported on those still active. 38 were still going strong
Prompted by Anne I took a look at the list of 50 blogs you need to read that I prepared for Inside History Magazine in 2014 (This list may vary slightly from that published by Inside History as I gave them a few runners-up for consideration). The audience for the list was genies and historians in Australia and New Zealand and the bias was towards blogs from ANZ.
Below is a list of those 46 blogs still active in 2017. Some bloggers on the list only posted once or twice while many were Quite productive. Commitment is important to me and I think that only posting once a year demonstrates that commitment may be on the wane. I wonder who will still be around at the end of 2018?
If I was preparing such a list in 2018 it would look different from the one below as I believe that several newer bloggers publish better products than some on this list.
I congratulate all the 2014 stayers on this list for keeping geneablogging alive.
Ancestor Chasing Kerryn Taylor
Anne's Family History Anne Young
Australian War Memorial now Memorial Articles
British Genes Chris Paton
By the Bremer: Memories of Ipswich
Canada Bay Connections Canada Bay Library
Dead Cert Meghan Hawkes
Diary of an Australian Genealogist Shauna Hicks
The Empire called and I answered Lenore Frost
Family History across the seas Pauleen Cass
Family Tree Frog Alex Daw
Fighting the Kaiser Cheryl G
Finding Family Jess
Geniaus Jill Ball
The Hocken blog Hocken Collections Uare Taoka o Hakena
Irish Genealogy News Claire Santry
Kintalk Auckland Libraries
Kylie's Genes Kylie Willison
Local Notes Leichhardt Library
Lonetester HQ Alona Tester
Lost Medals Australia Glyn Llanwarne
Moonee Valley Family and Local History Moonee Valley Libraries
My Past Whispers Lauren Bavin
Shaking the tree Su Leslie
Signposts: a blog about the encyclopaedia of New Zealand
Strong Foundations Sharon
Stumbling through the past Yvonne Perkins
The Tree of me Sharon Brennan
Timespanner Lisa Truttman
Worldwide Genealogy International collaboration
8 comments:
Hmm - Blogs are dead or fallen or ??? Well SOMETHING is keeping my fingers on the keyboard for the last seven years!
https://geelonganddistrict.com started in January 2011 and I've been working on it pretty consistantly since then.
https://justlovehistory.com started a little later - November 2014 - predominantly for the blogs that really didn't fit into the Geelong & District category but needed to be heard!
My blogs automatically go to my Facebook pages and Twitter accounts to reach more people but to find anything I've done there's only one place to search - on my blog. It's far easier and quicker than trying to find it on Facebook etc.!
Long live blogs - they're too much fun to let them fade away!
Western District Families was on each of the past lists and is still going with more readers than ever https://westerndistrictfamilies.com/
Less frequent and more irregular than I used to be, but I still find blogging worthwhile....it’s just that other life priorities sometimes get in the way. Maybe others are the same.
Hi Jill - thanks for the mention. I have migrated from blogger to wordpress and my new online research journal (with all the old posts migrated) is at https://ayfamilyhistory.com . I find I have more readers now than before, particularly as I have connected with more cousins :) The online research journal connects with cousins and also gives me chance to share with cousins I have connected with through other avenues, such as DNA.
I'm trying to take part in Amy Johnson Crows "52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks" challenge, so perhaps there will be a few more posts from me this year.
The Barwon Blog just turned 7 at the end of 2017. Some years have more posts than others, but it's definitely still going!
Campaspe Genealogy has been running since April 2010 - hard to believe it has been that long. I'm also taking part in the '52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks' challenge this year.
Thanks to those who commented. You all belong to the band of stalwarts who keep geneablogging downunder on the rails.
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