(Picture Credit - PSUCA)
Writing Online is what I do most these days. On Facebook
it's every day, of course. But otherwise on “Hello Poetry”, “VoicesNet”, “Poemhunter”
and several of my own Google “Blogger\Blogspot” blogs.
The other day I did some checking-back. I thought that
the “Triond” writing site ended years ago. I Googled to find out. The best
source I found on this question was myself! From what I can gather, Triond vanished from the web
around March 2016! Not long before that, they got rid of their vaunted “Forum”.
Then their domain licence ran out and they couldn’t be bothered to renew it.
From about 2008 or so, Triond was everything to me. I
wrote many blogs\articles on there because they gained far more views, comments
and money(!) than stories and poems. But I still posted lots of stories and
poems on Triond too. Then, of course, there was the Forum. I found it utterly
addictive, even though it was full of junk. Someone later reported that a
“Magog”, a Troll-like destroyer named after a race of “baddies” on sci-fi
series “Andromeda”, took down that Forum. I was “there” and still “fighting”
that Magog when the Forum disappeared.
Triond bought me a few good table tennis bats, but
not much more. But back then it was where I “lived” as an online writer. I miss
it. Still have a fair number of “Trionders” (fellow-writers) as Facebook
Friends and still play “Fantasy Premiership” with some of them.
“After Triond” it has been just about all poetry for
me. This week I wrote three table tennis blogs for a change, but this was
exceptional. But I think I need to get back to some blog and story writing.
That’s partly why I am typing this right now.
For the record I now have 427 poems on “Poemhunter”
– just about my whole “portfolio”- 431 officially as 3 of them are stories and
one is by my sister Joan Priestley. There are 281 of my poems on “Hello
Poetry”, along with 3 by my pub-lunch-buddy Norman Stevens and 1 by Elizabeth
Squires (unnamed). (Sorry for the Americanism there ha ha). On VoicesNet I have
350 poems (it says), Viewed 145,936 times (all of them being on Poemhunter too)
and 125 “Others” (stories and blogs), viewed 92,794 times. My Poetry Blog
contains 266 Poems (it says) and my “Story Blog” has 28 pieces. My main “blog
blog” has just 18 items but there are maybe 50 more blog entries around my more
“specialised” blogs. Needless to say, all my blogged-poems are on Poemhunter
too.
My most Viewed Blog Ever was the fake news special
“Crake Cake”, which as reported earlier received 217,390 Views on Triond by
September 2015 – about 6 months before that website vanished like a modern day
Atlantis. As regards poetry, “Me, Paul Butters” is my most-Viewed poem – On
“Hello Poetry” – at 18,600+.
Enough of boring stats. After all, my best viewed
pieces have been a spoof blog about a “health food” and a self-centred poem.
Which brings me to a slight concern: are these online writing sites an
extension of that worldwide phenomenon called “Social Media?
On television they
keep telling us that social media is “addictive” and potentially harmful. The
theory goes that getting “Likes”, “Comments”, “Shares”, “Views” etc. gives you
a Dopamine or Serotonin High. Or if you prefer, a boost of Endorphins or
Oxytocin. Which of course is addictive. Getting few Views or Likes of
course has the opposite effect on you. Apparently mobile apps etc. use bright
colours and other “temptations” to brighten up your online experience.
I must admit, I personally “use” “Hello Poetry” more
than any other site because there my poems usually “trend” and receive many
views and favourable comments. VoicesNet is quite good to me too and Poemhunter
has improved recently after a bad slump (for everybody active there).
Interesting too that Poemhunter bucked up when it got rid of its Forum. On the
other hand I confess that on sites where I’ve received harsh criticism, I haven’t
gone back. All this is surely “human nature”.
But worry not, dear reader. I still have a sense at the
back of my mind whether a poem I write is “any good”. Sometimes people even agree
with my judgements. At other times my more “inspired” and “hard worked” poems just
get ignored. But having done an English Literature Degree I’d like to think I learnt
some “Critical Sense”. Yes that’s a James Reeves reference. I recall that he described
true poetry as “magic”.
At the end of the “Critical Sense” book there are some
“samples” of poetry from a wide variety of poets. Reeves merely numbers them and
invites you to “tell” who has written what from your instincts. I was very good
at that. I did much the same on some “University Challenge” questions the other
night.
But I digress. What I’m trying to say is that I still
have a sense of what might be “good poetry”. “Me, Paul Butters” as a poem is not
very good and no number of “Views” from others will convince me that it is.
So from now on I feel that I need to stop being such
a “View Whore” and strive instead for more Quality. Do I feel another poem coming
on? Maybe soon. But when it comes I will be unable to resist it. I can barely stop
myself from writing. It is a compulsion. I have to do it. And do it I will.
Paul
Butters
©
PB 3\8\2018.
