{"id":5711,"date":"2023-06-09T10:56:38","date_gmt":"2023-06-09T10:56:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/forest-1041a2.ingress-bonde.ewp.live\/a-change-of-direction\/"},"modified":"2024-05-22T13:19:31","modified_gmt":"2024-05-22T13:19:31","slug":"a-change-of-direction","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/benrmatthews.local\/a-change-of-direction\/","title":{"rendered":"A Change of Direction"},"content":{"rendered":"

"direction"<\/p>\n

I have been blogging at Pudding Relations for 2 1\/2 years ago \u2013 not a bad run at all. But the irregularity of blog posts appearing there made me think that what I was writing about didn\u2019t interest me as much as it used to. A change of direction was needed.<\/p>\n

After a conversation one night with Stephen Davies<\/a> from PR Blogger, rather than writing about an area that is pretty crowded \u2013 Digital PR and Social Media \u2013 it made sense that I should write about more personal subjects. Bright One<\/a> has taken off in recent months,Twestival (led by the magnificent Amanda Rose) was a worldwide success story and has become a social media case study, and I\u2019m becoming more interested and involved with other projects outside the world of PR. As Stephen said, he definitely would rather read the thoughts and opinions of Ben Matthews, founder of Bright One, as opposed to Ben Matthews\u2019 thoughts on PR.<\/p>\n

There are plenty of people out there blogging about Digital PR and Social Media and I\u2019m not going to pretend that my blog ever produced any insight that you couldn\u2019t get elsewhere. If Digital PR and social media is what you\u2019re interested in reading about, then I would recommend you check out Neville<\/a>, Jed<\/a>, Michael<\/a>, Drew, Wadds<\/a>, Tim<\/a> or Stephen,\u00a0 as examples of fantastic blogs in those areas.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s not to say I\u2019m not going to write about those issues. They\u2019ll just become part of a larger remit for blogging that comes under the banner of\u00a0 \u2018social innovation\u2018, the meaning of which will become more clear as time goes on and more posts appear, but it revolves around charities, not-for-profits, social entrepreneurialism and other causes for good.<\/p>\n

So benrmatthews.com has become my new home (I registered the domains before Stephen could get his hands on them!). Most of you will know that benrmatthews is my online counterpart and a search on the most popular online social networks will prove that it\u2019s pretty easy to find me. It makes sense that the blog carries the same title<\/p>\n

The rise of platforms such as Twitter<\/a> and Posterous means that blogging is shorter, sharper and more social than ever. I still feel that blogging has a place, but it\u2019s by no means as popular or influential as it was even a year ago. I also believe that the rise of these social networking tools means that blogs can become more social than ever and I plan to make this blog a \u2018social platform\u2019 in itself and allow as much interaction as possible, using tools such as Tweetmeme, Chat Catcher, etc.<\/p>\n

So welcome to benrmatthews.com. Take a look around, make yourself at home and update your RSS feeds with this link. It\u2019s going to be an adventure and I want to make sure that you can come along for the ride.<\/p>\n

If you have any thoughts on all of this, I\u2019d love to hear from you in the comments section. If not, I hope you enjoy what you will find here!