ToxicPurity Plays 5 Questions With...

... Curtin University's Western Independent (also known as: What happened to Grok? Or was there a real newspaper at Curtin and I never noticed?)

Anyway, at last Wednesday's Awards Night, Enid asked if I would answer some questions for her paper. These were the questions she sent me, and these were my responses:

How/ why did you start blogging?
We've been online since the early-mid 90s, and so we've been blogging in one form or another since then. As to why, well, everyone has something to say, something to tell. We're no different. This is simply one outlet for communication. Also, both of us have always been lousy at keeping diaries. Online journals, however, are more like open letters. You are writing for an audience, even if you never meet them face-to-face. And your audience talks back. That's the difference - and great attraction - between merely keeping a diary, and blogging.

How would you describe to a non-blogger the content of your blog?
We blog about the film and television industry where we work, and about the quirks of Perth, stupid human tricks... anything that catches our fancy really.

What are your thoughts on blogs as a form of self-expression and online community?
Blogs are no different from any other form of self-expression. It's as easy to lie and create a fictitious persona in a blog as it is in prose or film. One could argue that the very act of blogging in effect creates a fiction about oneself, just as the act of keeping a diary creates a fiction about oneself, or the act of conversing with another person creates a fiction about oneself. It's about how we want to represent ourselves.

That said, blogging is a fascinating activity because it is both private and public. To express one's thoughts, opinions, rants... demands a willingness to expose one's inner self to an anonymous audience. You are at once vulnerable, and an exhibitionist - an intriguing position to be in.

And you're not alone. That's what the online community is: groups of virtually anonymous people partaking in conversations that they could not or would not have in other circumstances.

Has blogging brought you any celebrity status?
Uh, yeah. I rant for the cash prize and glory. Absolutely. Get your ToxicPurity T-shrts here.

What do you see for the future of blogs?
People were blogging before the word "blogging" was coined, and they will continue to blog long after the word "blog" is obsoleted. Even in those nations where blogging is restricted (China and the UAE, eg) people defy their governments to blog. Why? Because when people have something to say, they will find a means to say it. The methods will change as technology - and access to new technology - changes, but the impulse to communicate, to express oneself, to bitch and rant and moan and babble about everything and nothing remains unchanged. Call it a basic instinct: the need to talk to another human being.