Many years ago, long before most people had Internet access, I was involved in a great many online discussion forums on a company internal network. One of my friends and mentors back then was a man named Simon Szeto. Simon had been born in Hunan province in China, grownup up in Hong Kong and received his university training in the US. We both worked for the same US multi-national company at the time. He was based in Hong Kong at one point (prior to the UK handing Hong Kong back to China) and there were some issues that were creating quite a buzz at the time. Simon had opened an online forum to discuss the issue. Despite the fact that is was primarily a Chinese issue (I forget exactly what it was but I believe it had something to do with concerns about HK returning to China) most of the comments were coming from Americans and Europeans. Simon asked me to help moderate the discussion because the time difference meant that many potential troublesome comments were coming way outside his awake hours.  This was an interesting learning experience for me on several levels. But one thing sticks out above all.

I asked Simon why there was such an imbalance in where the comments were coming from. His reply was “The difference between Chinese people and Americans is that when the Chinese people have nothing to say they say nothing.”

Now I am an American and it is quite true that I have a lot of trouble keeping quiet. Like all too many Americans I seem to always want to put in my 2 cents worth. This is no less true online than it is in person. Still since that early conversation years ago I have tried to only say something when I actually have something to say. With mixed success of course. I confess that too often I give in to the urge to add a “me to!” sort of reply to a post or to create such a post myself. I look at my blog and think “I need to say something today.” I look at Twitter and think “No one has heard from me today.” All with the self absorbed conceit that people are out there waiting for me to say something. It’s part of my personality.

But I also find that the people I respect the most, the people whose opinions/writings are the most useful to me are the people who avoid saying things when they have nothing to say.

The best blogs are not the ones who have ten posts a day or even those who post 6-7 times a week. They are the blogs where a post shows up only when the person has something of value to say – something that adds to the conversation in a material way. There are many prolific bloggers out there who are quoted and linked to regularly that I have just given up on following. The noise to value ration is just not there. Often I see the valuable information they post somewhere else long before it shows up there – Slashdot being a great example BTW. It will show up in the post of someone whose posting rate is lower but whose value proposition is higher.

As I find myself overwhelmed with blog posts to read – caused by insatiable curiosity rather than actual need – I find myself looking at dropping the most prolific of blogs and focusing on value. Does the blogger have something new, original,to say or do they have real added value for the conversation? Are they the first to break news in a new area with a good, fresh explanation of why it matters? Or do they say things even when they have nothing to say? That is the new criteria I am using to narrow down my RSS feeds.

At the same time I look at activity on this blog. I’m writing less. Is that good or bad? Hopefully it means I am wasting less time for people. I see that links to my blog are way down. Is that because I am falling into the trap of saying things when I have nothing to say? Could be. Is it because I am saying less? That could be as well. But the goal should not be to write for volume but for value. Perhaps if I focus on that this blog (and my others as well) will develop a value proposition that will get people to follow, comment and link. And that would be a good thing. But even if the traffic isn’t there the value of the blog to me as a person will be better if I use it only to add to the conversation, to clarify my own thinking with original thought and when I have nothing to say I say nothing. That’s my goal as I rethink and reinvest my time with this blog. Please feel free to keep me honest BTW.