10 Reasons why blogging is better than Facebook

Many internet users are pathologically lazy and won't bother to follow their friends' blogs if they can have the reader's digest versions broadcast in their Facebook news feeds or Twitter pages. Likewise, many bloggers are lazy and often pamper to the immediate audience that they reach when they upload to Facebook, even though when we do that, we are often sacrificing diversity and depth.

Let's not let Facebook stamp on our style. Keep blogging, and here's why:

1. Bloggers don't feel obliged to condense everything until it's practically meaningless

Facebook isn't Twitter - who knows how far that tiny status update box can expand, yet somehow everybody seems to reduce their major life events to around 140 characters.

Instead of a loving obituary about your grandmother, she ends up with "R.I.P. Margo, died last night. Gonna be offline for a few days to go to her funeral in Montreal."

2. Blogging encourages you to reflect on the interesting things in life

When you're trying to maintain a blog, you look for interesting things to write about and you reflect on what you have discovered in great depth, because you are considering how you will write it up later. When you're presenting your life in status updates, photo uploads and links, you avoid depth and often only reflect on the things that have happened to you after somebody else posts a comment.

3. Blogging requires you to take time out

I've heard that it's possible to check Facebook just once each day - this has never happened for me. My experience of Facebook involves logging on for three minutes, adding a couple of comments, taking a break for half an hour and then adding a couple more.

When I blog, I sit down for half an hour and collect my thoughts, then I organise them and write them down.

Blogging is a pleasant pastime which provides a welcome break from the ongoing chaos of the day. Facebook is part of the ongoing chaos.

4. Bloggers can have all the colours in the world

Blue might be refreshing and gentle on the eyes, but after six years of being trapped between shades of CadetBlue and LightSlateGray, many Facebook users are unaware that CSS allows for the addition of red and green pigments. In fact, strange as it may sound, there are some colours which contain no blue whatsoever!

5. We can even personalise above and beyond colour schemes!

If you want to write a blog about working in an office then the Facebook stylesheets would be more than adequate. However most people blog about a particular hobby, lifestyle or other specific area, and so it's advantageous to create a look which is in-keeping with your theme. This means that visitors can take one look at your cursive font, tiled-puppy backdrop and mauve colour scheme and instantly determine whether or not they will be interested in oodles-of-poodles.blogspot.com, without having to read a thing.

6. Your blog layout won't suddenly change (unless you want it to)

It's a familiar tale of woe - girl pokes boy, boy pokes back, girl logs on to continue the hardcore flirtation only to find that Facebook has changed its layout and the poke options are nowhere to be seen. By the time she's learnt to navigate the new interface, he's fallen in love with her best friend and eloped.

With blogging you can set up a layout that your readers understand, and leave it like that for years to come.

7. Blogging can reach more people

Believe it or not, not all internet users are on Facebook. In this crazy world there are still one or two people, who haven't signed up to any social networking sites. If you keep a public blog, potentially anybody on the internet can follow it without having to sign in.

8. Bloggers are nobody's bitch

Well, that's not technically true - you're usually at the mercy of your hosting company, but at least you can have

www.i-am-nobodys-bitch.com rather than www.facebook.com/nobodys.bitch

9. You won't be tagged downing tequila on the back of a hippo on your blog (unless you want to be)

You steer the direction of your blog. You can choose what to post about and you can choose whether or not to moderate comments, or even completely disable them.

On Facebook, although you can restrict your privacy settings, the focus is very much on an interactive profile which includes contributions from your Facebook friends. If you wanted to post a series of notes called "Winter Surprises - A tasty seasonal recipe for each day of the week" you could well find your rustic cooking course interspersed with comments like "Heeeeeeey dude!!!!!!!! Your legs look guooooood in that dress on sat night. xoxoxo"

10. Blogging can lead to greater things

As a result of blogging, I've been invited to contribute to major magazines and newspapers and got close to a book deal. As a result of facebook posting I've been invited to join a group called "Can a Cornish Pasty beat the Sausage Roll that is tryin to beat Cheryl Cole?"

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