Rand Simberg at Transterrestrial Musings confesses:
I’ve always hated the word blog. It’s so ugly: it sounds like something mucky you get stuck in, and I remain embarrassed to this day to admit that I have one. But the word caught fire five years or so ago, and I could no more hold it back than could Canute the tide. But I’ll never call myself a blogger again. I’m a bloggist!”
Lileks coined the phrase back in December 2006
Blogger sounds like someone carrying big wobbly Hefty bags of Jell-O; bloggist has a certain precision, as well as an old-world charm. It also lends itself to bloggista and bloggisto, which moves the emphasis from the dull O to the pert & vivacious i vowel.
I know it’s highly unlikely to take hold, but I confess to feeling equally ashamed of the word “blog.” I always try to weasel around it, like blogs are only for tweener unicorn princesses or Perez Hilton (no, I will NOT link to him).
UPDATE: At last night‘s South Florida blogger dinner, Shel Israel pointed out that the whole idea of changing your title to connote greater credibility smacks of a lack of credibility in and of itself.
As someone who’s written before that credibility should come solely from credible work, not from a masthead (or a job title), I shouldn’t have let vanity get the best of me. Apologies.
Posted by Jason - GorillaSushi on February 9, 2007 at 11:26 pm
I agree with you (pre-update). “Blogger” is more than just a title. It can carry a stigma, suggesting vanity or conformity. Blogging has not been popular long enough to develop a cyclical pattern of favor. The connotations of both the word and the action will probably continue to evolve in the popular vocabulary.
Perhaps one day we will be saying “blogger pride” in mixed company without cracking a blush.