El Salvador: Reflecting on the Future of Blogs · Global Voices
Silvia Viñas

Like many netizens around the world, Salvadoran bloggers are discussing the future of blogs. Fernando Marroquin [es] and David Mejía [es] are two Salvadoran bloggers who have recently touched on the subject in their blogs.
Fernando Marroquin's post “The Salvadoran blogosphere is dying” [es] was prompted by a tweet where David Mejía (@damejiar) [es] refers to another Salvadoran blogger, Mario Francia [es], putting his blog “on hold”:
@damejiar: Pero leo que mi amigo @mariocopinol pone en stand by su blog, y solo ha recibido 2 comments?? Es la realidad :(http://t.co/ZhodrQZ7
@damejiar: But I read that my friend @mariocopinol is putting his blog on stand by, and he has only received 2 comments?? That's reality :(http://t.co/ZhodrQZ7
Image copyright Vima, from Shutterstock.
Fernando Marroquin writes [es] that “without a doubt, little by little the Salvadoran blogging community is fading away.”
Algunos -quizás David y yo estamos incluidos- a pesar de que no actualizamos nuestros blogs desde hace tiempo o no con la frecuencia que lo hacíamos hace unos años seguimos conservandolos. No se si mas por amor a esa época o porque realmente los usemos. Mas me inclino a que los que fuimos de los primeros blogueros lo hacemos por un sentimiento de lo que alguna vez fue una gran comunidad que incluso se reunía para discutir temas y conocernos.
Some -perhaps David and I are included- are keeping our blogs even though we haven't updated them in a while or as often as we did a few years ago. I don't know if that's more because we love that time or because we actually use them. But I'm inclined to think that those of us who were among the first bloggers do it for a sense of what once was a great community that even got together to discuss issues and meet each other.
He mentions the blog Hunnapuh, and adds:
La comunidad bloguera salvadoreña cada día se va reduciendo, hay que admirar aquellos blogs con el de Hunnapuh que siempre se mantienen, m que admirarlos hay que apoyarlos para que esa luz no se apague.
The Salvadoran blogging community is shrinking. We have to admire blogs like Hunnapuh which are still up; more than admire them we have to support them so that their light won't go out.
Fernando concludes:
Lo cierto es que este mi blog es un libro de recuerdos y mientras pueda, siento que en honor a la historia y lo que este blog representa no solo para mi sino para algunas personas mas, debo de mantenerlo en línea con la esperanza que de ves en cuando, como hoy, escriba algún articulo.
The truth is that this blog of mine is a book of remembrances and while I can, I feel that in honor of history and of what this blog represents not only for me but for some other people, I must keep it online with the hope that from time to time, like today, I will write a post.
David Mejía opens his post entitled “Are blogs dying?” [es] with an image of his Google Reader feed, where he found “a terrifying scene”:
Google Reader, “Are blogs dying?”. Image shared by David Mejía in his blog damr.net
Si, es la reaildad, tengo más de un año de no entrar pero el número de actualizaciones no era el que esperaba, en otro tiempo en una semana de no abrir el Google Reader hubiera encontrado por lo menos 7-8 entradas nuevas por cada blog, hoy los tiempos han cambiado, los medios han evolucionado y poco a poco podría suponer que los blogs mueren.
Yes, it's true, I hadn't opened Google Reader for over a year but the number of updates I found was not what I expected. In another time if I didn't open Google Reader in a week I would've found at least 7-8 new entries in each blog. Times have changed, and the media has evolved and little by little we could suppose that blogs are dying.
David concludes his post and invites other bloggers to comment on the issue:
Concluyo que solo pocos fueron los privilegiados que evolucionaron sus blogs a otro nivel (como ALT1040) y la gente los usa como referencias de peso, sin embargo con los pequeños la historia es diferente.
Aunque no tenga el mismo ritmo de actualización, para muchas ocasiones este blog informará, y lo hará en el momento oportuno.
I conclude that only a few were privileged and their blog evolved to another level (like Alt1040 [es]) and people use them as important references, however the story is very different for small blogs.
Even though it doesn't have the same updating rhythm, in many occasions this blog will inform, and it will do it at the appropriate time.
We conclude this brief reflection on Salvadoran blogs with a comment [es] on David's post by blogger Ligia, whose blog Qué Jóder turned 8 years old [es] on September 14, 2012:
La brevedad y la inmediatez de FB y Twitter cambiaron las cosas para quienes escriben y para quienes leen blogs (o solían hacerlo); se requiere menos tiempo para elaborar ideas/comentarios y menos tiempo de espera para recibir respuesta. Eso además de que ahora se descubre y comparte contenido de terceros porque honestamente, es, o parece, mucho más interesante que el propio.
Todavía no me veo dejando de lado mis blogs ni los que sigo, aunque la frecuencia de actualización haya disminuido.
The brevity and immediacy of Facebook and Twitter have changed things for those who read and write blogs (or used to); [Facebook and Twitter] require less time to elaborate ideas/comments and less time to wait to receive an answer. Also now you discover and share content by others because honestly, it is, or seems to be, a lot more interesting than your own.
I still don't see myself leaving my blogs or the blogs I follow, although how often they are updated has decreased.