Back in the early days of weblogs, in the mid to late 1990’s, postings were written with html coding, all done ‘by hand’ as I see that referred to. Blogging, seems to me, was a craft and the authors took pride in their hand coding, time consuming as it must have been. Now we have the ability to tap tap away and the coding just happens behind the scenes. So I thought to take a pause to reflect on our weblogging ancestors and extend some gratitude towards those who pioneered this liberating form. One in particular comes to mind.

Rebecca Blood’s on line archive goes back to 1999 and her weblog, Rebecca’s Pocket is still being updated regularly. One of the first books I bought was The Weblog Handbook, which she wrote in 2002. There is a wealth of practical information and guidance as well as clear and compassionate instruction on just how to behave on line. She talks about right speech in such a way that one can go into the seeming jungle confident to behave with integrity, and not sell out to popularity and loose ones sitting place.