I am feeling uneasy. I have been told that I should not be writing about a certain community I belong to (I don’t name them ever but I am still not allowed to write about them). I am feeling stuck though because I do a lot for this community and a lot with this community. I feel like I have been told to not speak about a large part of my life because of this.
I do not want to turn into a blog that only offers reviews and giveaways (even though that has been a lot lately as I have been so busy!). I want to be able to talk about my life and things I am doing. Do I just leave out this huge part of my life because it has “caused problems” even though it really shouldn’t have? My fear is that this blog is going to become a commercialized blog and not “ME” at all anymore.
I am not expecting advice or anyone to pick sides. I am just sharing my feelings because I am trying to work through them and this blog is a way for me to do that. It has been since it started and I don’t feel that should have to change.
katklaw777 says
No one ever said you should not put your personality and creativity into your blog but I agree with Rex above, two blogs is a wonderful solution. One to to do reviews and be a brand ambassador and one where you can pour out all your troubles and share and ask for advice. Hope you find an answer to your dilemma. I do wish you well and good luck.
Rose ~ RedNeck Witch says
Follow your heart and your head.
It doesn’t sound like a very friendly or inviting community since they want
to censor your site. (How does a community get new members if you aren’t allowed to speak of them, unless it’s Voldermort from Harry Potter)
Unless they pay for your bandwidth then I really don’t think
it’s their place to tell you what you can or can not blog about.
Best of wishes with your decision.
Aleksandra says
Honey, it’s YOUR blog. You’re so nice…I never read any degrating or rude remarks. Personally, I prefer blogs that mix reviews/giveaways with a personal aspect. So ignore your critics and keep doing what you’re doing.
carol says
I personally think you should stay true to yourself, do not bow down to anyone, do not let anyone control you, just respect yourself, we do!
mike says
I think you should share names and orginizations, as long as it is the truth, which it is, no one should be able to stop you. If these people and or organzations wouldn’t act so childish, they wouldn’t have a problem with it. If they can’t take the truth, stay off the internet.
Jean@ The ShoppinQueen says
Judging from what I’m seeing on this site, you’re an awesome brand ambassador, a person that any sensible organization would be proud to have representing them in social media. As long as you’re not slandering/libeling anybody why can’t you talk about anything you’d like here?
Danielle says
Wow, that’s rough. While I understand if the organization/community you are part of doesn’t want you talking about them online…. I sort of think that’s dumb. I mean, aren’t you one of their best PR/promotion vehicles? If you are spreading their message, good work, whatever they do… isn’t that only good for them? I would understand if you were giving too much information away, but cutting you off completely when you obviously have good intentions? That’s silly.
If you still want to be able to blog about that (and I get why. Leaving out such a huge part of your life sort of seems deceitful, no?) I would talk to them about it. Explain to them why you post, why it is useful that you are doing this. If they still don’t buy it, do as Jean says and make it clear in your description that this is a personal site and doesn’t reflect the views of that community. Furthermore, don’t use their name in posts.
And if you think you don’t want to post about that at all anymore in light of this…. maybe think of a new direction. A new hobby, a new interest. I always blogged about TV. My blog was a TV blog. And then, because I work for a design firm, I was always looking at these great design sites. And then I started looking at fashion sites. That sort of became my hobby. So I started a blog focused on that. Maybe step out of the box and find something to fill the hole for you.
Good luck!
Rex Dixon says
Set up another blog. If you use a good hosting service that offers this such as Bluehost who I use, it’s quite easy to keep adding more blogs to the mix. But as the others above say, you can just blog about whatever you want – it’s your domain, your site, etc… But in the long run, you should try to centralize a theme per site if you can; just blogging 101 there.
Jean says
You know, this is YOUR site, you & only you get to decide what happens here. You are the host at this virtual table. I totally get why you don’t want to be just a product review/giveaway site. You might consider doing as I have done, rewrite your site description to indicate that this is a personal blog, that occasionally reviews products that interest you.Take the pressure off yourself to crank out reviews & restore your writing voice:)
Robyn Wright of Robyn's Online World says
Do what your heart says
Cindy says
YOu have a right to blog about any topic that moves you! Others have a right to say whatever they like about that. You have a right to ban them from commenting and ignore their emails. :0)