Russell Beattie sums something up that I’ve been thinking for a while about personal blogging punditry in 2009:

Man, I wish I could just sit down and write like I used to on a daily basis.

It feels *different* though... Keeping a weblog seems to have become a sort of a mid 2000's fad that has passed its peak and starting to fade into obscurity, and maybe even soon ridicule along with bell-bottom jeans and mullets. Even though I love putting my thoughts out there, in the back of my mind it's almost embarrassing to add to the cacophony of opinions that now flow daily from every orifice of the Internet from people who just haven't gotten the message that it's just not cool any more. I mean, hey, let's face it - Social Networking elected the current US president, not blogging.

I can't seem to get into the habit... - RussellBeattie.com

I started blogging back in 2001/2002 on my own domain (with about 5 readers as I didn’t have “Microsoft” attached to my name) and continued to blog (this time as a fitness blogger) once I joined Microsoft.  In December 2004 I “reopened” my personal blog here on Spaces – Torres Talking – and for a few years I was rockin’ it, posting at least 5-8 times monthly with posts that took me time to research, think about, write, and comment on.  For a while I was in the Technorati 100 back when it mattered but given my lack of attention to this site since my daughter was born on Oct 07, I don’t even show up in a Live Search for “Mike Torres” anymore!

Oh well.

I’ve talked about this before, but there are lots of reasons for slowing down in addition to the embarrassment factor Russell calls out above.  For one, I spend 8-12 hours each day writing between email, product specifications, and vision memos… so the last thing I want to do in downtime is write more.  Secondly, time spent training (martial arts/strength training) cuts into already valuable time with my family and it’s frankly just more important to me than blogging.  And of course, downtime during early mornings, nights, and weekends are best spent with my wife and daughter.  The little one changes every single week and if I don’t spend enough time with her during any given week, I can feel her changing without me, and it’s one of the worst feelings in the world.

I think another real factor is that I contribute thoughts in other ways.  Twitter updates, SmugMug photos, Facebook comments, Google Reader shared items, and Windows Live to pull it all together for people… they all give me an outlet that takes seconds instead of hours, and anyone following that stream will immediately know where my head is without reading a bunch of prose.  Some examples of items from my Twitter feed which I would have blogged about back in 2006:

• Omar & I are giving a talk at TechReady next week, "Getting Things Done like a Ninja at Microsoft" - 350+ people projected, yikes!
• Offline Gmail is so NOT interesting, but the Labs concept continues to provide small reasons not to switch away
• Amazon Kindle 2 coming February 9th? Maybe I'll finally ditch books.
• IE should stop *clicking* every time it loads a page; first thing I turn off (but I'm sure most people just deal with it)

Each one could have been a long-winded post like this one, but instead I got the thoughts off my chest and got feedback on them almost immediately.

Now having said all of that, I do still love blogging (and Windows Live Writer) and want to keep this site alive for the foreseeable future – just without the “web 2.0 remorse” of letting it sit here.  So I’ll continue to post long-form posts every month (or three or four) and I’d really like to start talking more about the new Windows Live Movie Maker once we’re ready to talk about it.  I’m thrilled to be working on a project so many people care so much about and is so well timed with market needs.  So I’d like to make sure I can have an ongoing dialogue with folks about it on this blog, on Twitter, and anywhere else I can.  Again, once we’re ready to talk more about it.  But that will hopefully be nice and focused, not the inane ramblings of some random dude.

If you still want the inane ramblings of some random dude, just catch me on Twitter ;)