Welcome to Grouchy Blogger

In the two years or so that I have been running Neuvo, I have come to realise that if I want my posts about the things in my world I have issues with to merit more than a passing scroll, it is probably a good idea to dedicate a blog to those posts.  Neuvo, for better or worse, has become my humble shadow version of Boing Boing.  It satisfies needs but isn’t really suited for my rants.

Aside from that, I have also realised that to give any one topic its due attention, you need to focus on that topic so rather than pursuing my original model for Neuvo as an “all in one” blog, I have come to realise that Darren Rowse was right, it is better to focus blogs on particular niches.  Grouchy Blogger is my niche blog where I will focus on issues and companies that just irk me because they ignore the well-being of us “little” people (not quite true these days anymore) and focus on their own self-serving interests to the detriment of anyone who doesn’t buy into their crap.  One of the companies I tend to focus on these days is Telkom, an evil corporation that happens to still enjoy an effective monopoly over South Africa’s fixed line telecommunications infrastructure.

If you are wondering where I came up with the name “Grouchy Blogger”, it comes from two sources really.  The first is the “we’re angry” statement on the Missing Link website that really appeals to me and encapsulates my thoughts about evil corporations and downright stupid things in our world:

Missing Link is a specialist presentation firm, and we’re angry. Seriously angry! We’re angry at the forced boredom presenters are submitting their audiences to; especially as the alternative is actually easier, and takes less effort.

Of course I am not too concerned about presentations techniques for the purposes of this blog (actually my main preoccupation with presentations is that I’d love to be able to make Keynote presentations to my classes rather than have to use chalk on the boards) but I share the sentiment.  I am angry that evil corporations do the things they do because they can.  I am angry that mediocrity so often reigns in the local Webspace.  Actually there are a couple things that tick me off.  Hence I am a tad grouchy.

My second source of inspiration is John C Dvorak‘s new podcast called Cranky Geeks.  When I think about that title and what little I know about Dvorak’s approach to things, it works for me.

Over time I am going to migrate my “rant” posts from Neuvo to Grouchy Blogger to flesh it out a bit and also put that content where it belongs.

I hope you will subscribe to my feed and even bookmark this blog.  It may prove entertaining.  Or not.  I am sure it will prove to be a pretty good avenue for me to vent my frustrations!

Technorati Tags: angry, boing boing, cranky geeks, grouchy blogger, missing link, neuvo, problogger, evil corporations, Telkom