Editor’s Blog

Steffie Corcoran, Editor
Photo by JOHN JERNIGAN

On Blogging

By STEFFIE CORCORAN
October 21, 2011

Born in late 1962, I straddle Baby Boomer and Gen-X demographics. In other words, I’m not hard-wired for blogging. (Several years ago, our then very young associate editor Brooke Demetz, now Adcox, had to explain to me what a blog was.) Over the past several years, new blogs have piled up like college football players on a fumble, and, like everyone else with a computer, I’ve stumbled upon the good, the bad, and the ugly in the genre. 

Unfortunately, reading the online musings of others can be an important reminder of why diaries are and should remain private. The disconnect is this: As in most writing endeavors, it’s awareness of audience, and commitment to entertaining and/or informing that audience with carefully wrought content, that makes a blog—or, say, a magazine like Oklahoma Today—a sought-after and consumable entity. Successful publications, in other words, create a compulsive yen among readers to get their hands—or eyes—on more and more of their content. This is something that J.K. Rowling, David Remnick, and Arianna Huffington instinctively understand. 

The Oklahoma blogosphere includes those who get it, too, and provide meaningful content to engaged audiences: Jenx67.com (Oklahoma City resident Jennifer James’ sensitive and insightful commentary on all things Oklahoma and Gen-X), DailyThunder.com (Royce Young’s exhaustive blog on all things Oklahoma City Thunder proves sportswriters don’t need a paper product to be readable and relevant), PioneerWoman.com (the reigning Queen of All Bloggers in the Known Universe and Beyond), and OklahomaRock.com (Oklahoma Today contributor Ryan LaCroix should one day become Oklahoma’s official musicologist). 

With the relaunch of OklahomaToday.com, it’s time to hurl myself into the raging waters of the blogging superstream, time to start considering, hopefully even anticipating, what you want to hear from me next—and then, fingers crossed, deliver. 

No editor is a blogging island, so you’ll soon be seeing entries from our other editorial staff members—Megan Rossman, Nathan Gunter, and Karlie Tipton—as well. Drop us a line at Editorial@OklahomaToday.com and let us know what you think. Meanwhile, down the rabbit hole we go!