Losing your life, one post at a time…

My archive section will tell you that this is my oldest post here.

The truth is though, it wasn’t my first blog post ever. One of the early ones on the Indian blogosphere, I started blogging in May of 2002 at Blog-City.com, my url - melody.blog-city.com

Don’t bother going there, because all you’ll find is this:

This is what happened - I was living away from home in those days in a place with no internet access. I used to write all my blog posts in a word document with the correct dates & then copy paste them whenever I got home in my blog on the corresponding dates.

My “system” was really working for me, until one day, I reached home & omg, my blog - and all my blog posts - completely deleted. To my utter dismay I checked my email and found 3 “notices” that had been sent to me in the past month to update, or lose the blog. Since I hadn’t been home in over a month, I, by default, “lost” my blog - and along with it, over two years worth of entries.

Blog-city turned a pay site and lots of others who were regulars, are no longer around. Added negative: I also lost lots of “friends” - like Leah, a young teacher from the UK, who wrote one of the best blogs I read in those days - Ducksecho.blog-city.com. Why “Duck’s echo” ? Yeah, that was the question I first asked her too, before we became online friends who read each other’s blogs. I do hope she’s out there somewhere still blogging, she really is a fabulously funny writer.

As any serious blogger, who’s ever lost any post for whatever reason will tell you, losing a blog post is like losing a part of you. And losing years worth of posts, is like losing a bit of your life. Most of us, I’m guessing, do not go into our archives and read our old posts. But there’s a certain security in just knowing that they’re there, if ever we do feel like reminiscing. Or if we want to double check a date or a fact or to link to something that we felt/went through a long time ago that has some relevance currently.

Saket Vaidya knows what I’m talking about - he lost three and a half years worth of posts. His controversial posts (any of you remember his preference for North Indian women over their South Indian counterparts?!) that wrecked havoc on the Indian blogosphere, his funny posts (like his preference for small breasts! Viva Kate Moss!) and so much more, all gone. To quote him:

“that psychopath is yours truly, and is deeply pained”

Hardik Shah, a new friend, was telling me just yesteday of his similar woes he faced pre 2004. All he could do, was keep shaking his head and say: “Tcshay”.

Sadly, I’m sure there are many others, perhaps many of you reading this now, who have lost blog posts. I empathize, it is indeed like losing part of our lives.

Then again, it may not be the big deal that I’m making it out to be.

Tags: Archives, Blog Posts, Blog-City, Hardik Shah, Indian Blogosphere, Losing Blog Entries, Old Blog, Saket-Vaidya, Vulturo