This morning I decided to just go on a reading rampage and I somehow landed on Emily Gould’s Essay, [1] Exposed, on the New York Times website. This article can really, and truly (that’s a first) be summed up by its heading on the front page of the New York Times, What I Gained, and Lost, By Writing Online. Usually headings are deceiving or hyped to attract your attention.

I have read about the consequences of personal blogging before, so this article is nothing new. But what I find strange, and I shouldn’t, is how people always react.

Let’s see, they read the article and then make comments like these:

At first, I thought I was reading the sophomore page of the student newspaper at Harding High in Yokelville, Ohio. Then I realized that it was the New York Times.
Just awful.

— Ego Nemo, Eastern U.S.

Why is this article on the top of the times home page?? This is what is important to us??

— ML, new york

Dear Ms. Gould: Thanks for exhibiting the empty narcissism of so much blogging. As for “Josh”’s article on you in the NYPost, all one can say is, what goes around comes around–and the hypocrisy of your talking about it like a “personal betrayal” is either audacious in its flagrant, cynical hypocrisy or depressing in its utter lack of self-awareness.

Like your tattoos, I’m fairly sure you’ll regret all this by the time you get into your 40s. From now on, I’d urge you to refrain from mutually polluting your private life, and public discourse, with such things.

Best regards,

CTMathewes
Charlottesville, Virginia

— CTMathewes, Charlottesville, VA

If you have to make such comments, why read the article in the first place? The number one comment disparaging a personal blog or article is the one where the commentator is asking for the, however many, minutes it took to read the article back! As in “there goes 15-minutes of my life wasted.”

Other outrages comments are an attack on the newspaper for placing the article on the frontpage the first day. “Is this what you call journalism? With so many things to report, such as the fight on cancer, the war, etc.” Give me a break people. If I want to learn about cancer there are plenty of places online where I can go and read up on the latest treatments and even donate.

I am not a Gawker reader, never have been even though I have seen it mentioned so many times. And I really had no idea who Emily Gould was, and after reading some of her stuff on Gawker and seeing Emily Gould being [2] interviewed I don’t think I even want to know anymore. But her tragic online experience does have a lesson to teach. For example, without even placing my life out there in public like Emily Gould did, I can still feel how hurt these people are, and therein lies the lesson.

I am sure anyone who is writing about their personal life and about the people in their lives will take a step back after reading her article and think very hard before they continue or even start if they are contemplating such a dangerous move.

So… Yes! Articles like Emily Gould’s essay do have value even despite the many comments attacking the article and the newspaper.
[3] Beam Me Up! News