Why Ghost Blogger? (2)

Posted on August 28, 2007
Filed Under Culture, Fatih Syuhud, Indonesia, Internet, Lifestyle

In responding to my posting Why Ghost Blogger?, Nad’s Note turns heavily “philosophical”. He argues that the purpose of her being pseudonymous is, in her own words, “to minimize such tendency…” i.e. any bias of the writer concerned. Visit her good blog for full understanding of her raison d’etre

Well, first of all thanks to Nad’s very insightful explanation about the ghost blogger world. Despite I am not so sure whether her rationale is typically hers or represent other bloggers, at least I believe she’s voiced her very interesting point of view of her own.

Secondly, when I wrote the piece what I had mind was not about Blogger Indonesia, because Indonesian bloggers mostly tend to blog with full personal clarity: their identity, their full name and even their background (academics and family).

I saw, interestingly and strangely, ghost or pseudonymous blogger phenomenon more as a western blogger tendency. Especially those who blog on current events_politics or religious matters. If you browse the internet, you’ll find many of them. Including some westerners who blog on Indonesia like Jakartass and Indcoup.

I’ve got a ’strange’ experience when an Australian links one of my blog to his own. once I knew it, I link his blog back in my blog–this is one of unwritten conventional rule in blogger world: whenever someone link your blog, you’re obliged to link it back. To my amazement, he emailed me and asked me “not to link his blog”.

Thirdly, blogger is an ego-driven medium, a self-publishing means and a self-satisfying “lust” of own-self existence. Let’s be honest about it. You feel satisfied and ecsatic when your posting got much attention and for the sake of that some bloggers even ready to “sacrifice” his “niche” by attaching unnecessary and irrelevant picture; you’re happy when your blog being linked by many other blogger, hence your blog rating are getting higher; and unhappy when your post and blog in the low-end. From these premises, the existence of ghost-blogger is self-contradictory.

Fourthly, so, what’s left to explain why someone need to be a ghost or pseudonymous? It’s harsh to say that they’re just not gutsy enough to show their head hidden under the beach sand. I dont want to be judgemental to say that they’re a bunch of cowards who want to say anything without any need to be accountable to whatever they’ve said.

But one thing is clear, by being ghosty, pseudonym or anonym or whatever, they’re lacking in credibility. For me, credibility in virtual world is a combination of at least four things: clarity of our personality, our deeds, our words and our consistency of the last two points. So, to sum it up, I tend to agree to disagree with Nad’s on this point.

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