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Learning.  That’s what we’ve been doing the last two years, and for the last year here on this blog.  We’ve been learning what it takes to develop applications on the web.  We’ve been learning what it takes to start a company while holding down a 9-5, and paying attention to our wives and children.  We’ve been learning how to write.

About blogging, we’ve learned a few things too.  First of all, blogging is difficult.  Unless you’re going to copy content it’s pretty tough to come up with original compelling material with any regularity.  And writing isn’t as easy as it sounds either.   Finding a voice, and making your writing interesting and witty and controversial while making sure it’s really me and is true to what we believe?  Those are pretty interesting questions as it turns out.  And like anything else, you need lots of reps to get good at it.

Anyway, the point of all that is that it is a preamble to this: we’re going to take a little bit of a new direction with the blog, starting with a rewrite of the pay it forward ninja series.  You see, this blog is a lab for us to experiment with our ideas as much as it is a place for us to display the finished product that is our ideas.  This is where we give you insight into our thoughts and the process of building this idea of foyble from the ground up- and we learned something with that series.  So below are a few ways that we’ll be changing the way we blog.  One of our favorite internet-types is Merlin Mann.  Some of the phisolophy we are applying to this site we learned from reading him.  From his essay “Better” is this quote:

What worries me are the consequences of a diet comprised mostly of fake-connectedness, makebelieve insight, and unedited first drafts of everything. I think it’s making us small. I know that whenever I become aware of it, I realize how small it can make me. So, I’ve come to despise it.

With this diet metaphor in mind, I want to, if you like, start eating better. But, I also want to start growing a tastier tomato – regardless of how easy it is to pick, package, ship, or vend. The tomato is the story, my friend. - Merlin Mann, “Better”.

How are we going to grow our tomatoes better?

1.  Frequency=less. This is an act of self-preservation and attempt to improve quality.  Making some kind of fake quota for posts for the blog doesn’t really serve any purpose- especially for a new blog with no discernible readership and no Vice President of SEO trying to drive traffic here every day.  And I refuse to write posts simply to put words that equal search terms out here.  I want people to find us, like us, join us, and join this conversation.  I don’t think I need SEO for that.  I think I need to write interesting stuff for that to happen.  So with that eye towards quality we are taking a more long-form posting approach.  Our posts will be well reasoned, thoughtful, and edited.  We will research the ideas in them and cite that research.  We want our work to be worthy of your time and thought-provoking.  As an example, I’m looking to rewrite the ninja series and posting once every three to five weeks.  So there’s no need to refresh these pages every 20 minutes.  Your time and attention are important to us.

2.  Visually interesting=more. If we are going to write 2,000-word mega posts once a month, I better do something to break the text up.  So I’ll use a more interesting visual style with text and colors.  Note: I have no idea what this will look like yet.  But I promise not to try to give you a headache.  If that happens it will be an accident.  We are also going to try to use original content for pictures.  I’m not promising that there won’t be some stock stuff here and there, but for the most part the pictures out here will be our own stuff- and that includes drawings by us.  This may turn out to be an utter disaster, as I draw worse than I write.  But hey original content rulz.

3.  Content types=varied.  I think we are going to try to do some video posts.  I think.  I have this flip video camera just collecting dust so I’m going try to use it to record myself and others saying things about foyble.  And we have some ideas about a podcast.  But now I’ve said too much and I’m overcommitting us to things we might not be able to deliver so that is all about videos and podcasts for now.  But maybe we will have those things here on this blog sometimes.

This is possibly the wrong direction to take with the blog.  An informal poll of my friends had us split on the issue.  Some people believe that we really do need to give you a reason to come back more frequently.  I would like to have content here at least once a week, but I need people to help me create it.  If you are interested in contributing to this blog, or know someone who might be, please contact us.  We’ll try to put the little snippets we find from around the web out on our twitter feed (foyble_org), so please follow us on that channel as well.

Thanks for your time.  Please join the conversation and help us build this community.  Subscribe to the blog and get ready for another go at the PIF Ninja series….

Best,

Brian, Jerry, and John.