To document.
Whether we are blogging as a promotional mechanism, to help spread useful information, or simply to be heard, all of that boils down to documentation.
Bear with me a moment while I give you some background to a point I’ll make another paragraph or two down. The movie “300” (2006), the classic story of how a tiny Spartan force of 300 defeated hundreds of thousands of Persians, was popular because it’s really a timeless story. It’s about clever strategy standing a real chance against evil and pure might. About how a single event can change the course of history for the entire world. About events that happened once, and which are repeated over and over again in small ways in every culture on the planet.
Not many realize that the events in that book and movie are based almost entirely on the single surviving account, written by a fellow named Herodotus. Herodotus is often called “the first historian”, because he didn’t write poetry, or about philosophy or religion. He wrote down that which he observed, and what was told to him that had been passed down through oral tradition. He was really the only one to attempt to document this time in world history.
Here’s my point: Herodotus was the first blogger.
He sold his material in his lifetime, and it was clear that he wrote for the masses. This is evidenced by the fact that he was granted, by public vote, public money to further his work. (How far do ten talents go these days, anyway?) His posts come from as far away as Pharaonic Egypt and back up to Western Europe. He was objective, and as accurate as he could have been at the time.
Being a political upstart, he didn’t think of himself as a reporter, because he was outside the realm of (his own) traditional media. He tells fantastic, inspirational stories from real life that have wide-reaching applications. He was a lifelong advocate for freedom, including in that of his own work, and that of others. And his work spread because of viral mechanisms – not sophisticated ones, but effective nonetheless: gossip.
Any of that sounding familiar?
Herodotus clearly understood the importance of documentation. In his main life’s work “The Histories”, he travels extensively to test the accuracy of what he is told by many local peoples. The first few lines of Book One read as follows: “Herodotus of Halicarnassus here displays his inquiry, so that human achievements may not become forgotten in time, and great and marvellous deeds – some displayed by Greeks, some by barbarians – may not be without their glory; and especially to show why the two peoples fought with each other.”
Not just how, where, and over what the Greeks and Persians fought, but why. He carefully notes that he will document the deeds of non-Greeks alongside those of his own adopted people. Sounds pretty fair to me, and what I aspire to in my own blogging efforts. Just as long as I don’t have to write it in classical Greek.
