Digital gardens and blogs are on a spectrum
I’ve been reading about digital gardens, which are personal websites that are organized like “freeform, work-in-progress wikis.” Rather than polished articles, digital garden entries are more loose, more like notes and ideas. And given that it’s a garden, the author comes back to tend it—editing entries, adding information, and reorganizing. This is how a digital garden differs from a traditional blog that has finished posts in chronological order.
Digital gardens are about process and craft. Blogs are for fleshed-out ideas and cohesive thinking.
Maybe.
As I was reading about digital gardens and going down this rabbit hole, I got the impression that there isn’t a clear divide between digital gardens and blogs, aside from site structure. The difference is in how the author uses their space and what their intentions are. I see overlap between blogs and digital gardens; not a clear divide.
A blog can use categories and tags to navigate topics. Posts can link to each other (interlinked). The writer can go back and edit posts whenever. These characteristics can apply to digital gardens as well as blogs.
My blog is my way of “working with the garage door up” and showing my work. Working out in the open welcomes conversation and discussion…and hopefully offers ways to connect with people. I think that’s what the internet is for at its core.
I like using my blog to write about ideas. It could be something I came across reading (an article, a book) or watching (a TV show, a movie, a YouTube video). This post itself came out of learning about digital gardens. (So meta!)
And to be frank, blogging is writing practice. I write with pen and paper in a journal most days, but that’s free flowing. It doesn’t need to have structure or organization. That’s just for me. Blogging is still for me, but it’s also writing for other people to read. I spend some time organizing and editing, but I still don’t treat blog posts as formal writing. Some other blogs are definitely more formal. That’s up to personal intention.
