A blog on blogs

This is an interesting article on Japan's blogging culture. There, blogs aren't a vehicle for self-promotion or polemical tirades. They're humble records of daily life, in the apparently long-standing Japanese tradition of diary-keeping. The article attributes this blogging posture to a number of factors, primary among them a Japanese social ethic of humility and deference. It's interesting to me--although it shouldn't be surprising by now--that a nation generally without Christian tradition would embody some fundamental tenets of the Christian spirit in, of all places, its blogosphere. It's disappointing to me that, once again, Americans touting their Christian tradition prove to be so often brash, offensive, and proud in their own electronic communications.

I'd like to think that the blogs I frequent--those of my friends, mostly--occupy an honorable position in the blogosphere, avoiding the showing-off that is such a temptation with this medium. I'd also like to think that our blog here is more a record of our lives, our thoughts, and our treasures than a venue for self-aggrandizement. I also use it as a practice of discipline in my writing, but in that context I can be prone to showing off. So, in a motion of transparency here, a confessional litany of words I paused over (because I wanted to sound a little smart or clever) while writing this post: polemical, postures, social ethic, tenets, confessional litany. OK, enough about me. Read the article.