The Digital Lumberjack - When life goes digital

The greatest hope of internet generation is that you can share your thoughts with everybody in the world. The greatest letdown of the same generation is that nobody cares. Still, that doesn't keep us from trying.

Ted Dziuba

I don't have any doubt that the first thought of many of my friends reaching this blog will be something like "I knew this guy was nuts!"

Yeah right. Why would any normal person keep a blog? Don't only nerds and such sort of socially troubled people do it? Come on! It is a lot of work for just exposing one's private life and simple minded thoughts. Isn't it?

Well, keep thinking that way and you will be missing a great tool for improving your career, personal growth, social connections and much more. It is the single most important thing you can do in social media if you take that seriously.

Unless you understand the reasons for reading a blog, I have my doubts that you will understand my reasons for blogging. However for explaining this, I can give you a short but detailed list of my reasons.

It is an extension of my mind

The life of a computer scientist, like those of any other living entities, is full of new discoveries. In my case I have a problem to have a grasp of all of them. Whenever I learn something new I try to write some notes about it and put them together in this blog. Whenever I am I can read them, and if any friend of mine is battling with the same thing I can point them here.

You will never get a better review

If four eyes sees better than two (supposing that none of the subjects is one-eyed), how better can see thousand of eyes? Any of my personal values or opinions can be discussed by anyone. I would be excited even if someone makes a bad review. As far as the guides I wrote about before, if I am missed something, hopefully someone will tell me.

Your best loved ideas might expand

When I wrote my master thesis I was really excited, so much that I decided to make it available on the internet. I would feel really proud of it if someone tries to continue that work. Meanwhile I push some things on my free time and anyone can criticise it and is free to come with ideas that can make it better.

It makes me think

When I write I force myself to put straight my thoughts and make some logic out of it. Sometimes it becomes an objectives declaration and I realize not only the power of putting down with words my plans, but showing the whole world about it. Overall and for the same reasons, sometimes it becomes quite a psychological test.

It is a great connection

I expect people with similar thoughts and interests to keep reading this post. I have no doubts that with them I will make more complete my knowledge about the things I write. Specially, when they start responding with smarter comments than my posts.

Still Alive Proof

I am a lowsy penpal, most of my distant friends hardly ever get news about me, except for the important dates. Blogging is a way to show them I am alive and with a personal section they can read about my life.

I don't speak English

At least not natively. I have already been accused of high treason among some peers, but come on, I already know how to write in Spanish. A good command of the English language is always a nice asset to have. Being an Engineer myself I am forced to write technical documents in English. Although anyone can understand what I write about, I would rest better thinking that my documents are something decent and error free. This blog is my biggest tool for learning properly the language, but sometimes feels like overly bold to write so much in it.

Need to practice my writing

I spent two years in a literature course and some years later I had to write my master thesis. My best experience out of it was learning how important it is to craft effective sentences and choose the right words. Between the course and my thesis I had not written too much and I realized that one not only needs a lot of practice to write properly, but needs to keep doing it. My skills are not as good as back then, but I have no doubt that within some years I will be able to look back my first posts and cringe when comparing the level I will achieve.