I am not among The Guardian list of “the world’s 50 most powerful blogs” (and that’s OK)

Paintings by Tarek Chemaly

So The Guardian simply issued “the world’s 50 strongest blogs” record (right here).

Did I miss my likelihood for greatness? Effectively, I did that – way back. How you might ask? By not accepting to monetize my readership. When blogs the place accepting paid posts left and proper when running a blog was in its infancy in Lebanon (and type of worldwide), I caught to my weapons and mentioned no clearly (thoughts you my gripe, which I made clear again then was not that they have been accepting paid posts for manufacturers, however fairly than the posts weren’t declared as such resulting in the paid posts in query as to be complicated to the reader).

And right here we’re – in 2022 – the place somebody who posts a picture on Instagram considers themselves as being blogger. From the unique pack of all of us who began running a blog, solely 2 “blogs” survive, the second is only a place to publish press releases by manufacturers and an Instagram account. However when it comes to those that really “wrote”/”commented” I’m actually, “the final man standing”.

Certain if you base your weblog on saying issues about firms, getting (undeclared) freebies, and all that, then you find yourself travelling, after all the supply materials goes to dry up, and as one other individual mentioned on Twitter “pricey bloggers, please bear in mind information businesses nonetheless exist”. They usually do, which means all those that had a google notification about “Lebanon” and parroted the information, now have vanished.

I believe, oddly, this weblog has all the time been “below the radar”, I by no means made any effort to market it. I believe it’s is a type of “if you realize you realize”. And fortunately, sufficient folks know. Sure, sure, I mentioned it earlier than a number of instances, that whereas the weblog doesn’t price me “cash” it does price me “time”. However it’s time I’m prepared to present out, simply to be that dissenting voice who doesn’t copy paste press releases from manufacturers and fairly stand apart and say the place the issues of the advertisements are – or, paradoxically, give accolades the place accolades are due.

You understand what? I do not wish to be on The Guardian’s record of the world’s 50 strongest blogs.

Significantly, however subsequent time I’m taking some foolish marketing campaign down – objectively, with no malice – that very same marketing campaign that Marlene/Zeina/Tony/Ali described on Fb as “yiiii chou hal ebde3” (oh what creativity!) I do know I’ve completed my mission proper.