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Can we also have an AskUbuntu community blog like superuser.com?

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    We could. But what would we put there. It's not a matter of "can" we - but more to the tune of "why" would we. There already exists planet.ubuntu.com which mentions Ask Ubuntu a few times already.
    – Marco Ceppi Mod
    Commented Mar 17, 2011 at 18:04
  • Update: 2buntu.com is probably the closest thing to a community blog - anyone is welcome to contribute articles through the review process there.
    – Nathan Osman
    Commented Oct 9, 2016 at 2:18

4 Answers 4

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I beg to differ! No authoritative blogs for that market? Guess you never heard of Lifehacker, HowToGeek or any of the large Windows oriented sites? Either way, I don't think the point is to compete, but to aggregate the site itself.

When writing a blog you're always wondering, what should I be writing about next? Which in most cases mean blogs will try to stay on top of the news in search for the next best thing to blog about. The big advantage you guys have is that the community has already showed you what they think is hot at this moment:

Basically you have a whole community telling you what they want you to write about! Furthermore, in a lot of cases an answer is correct and solves the problem, but doesn't really address how it solved the problem. Don't we all prefer teaching our users to fish? So you can cover the basics, which will hopefully allow users to ask better questions. Sure, this content can be found anywhere else, but if it was that easy, why are some users still having problems with hooking up their iPhone with Ubuntu?

Furthermore, there are things that are only relevant to your community. Perhaps you guys have an infamous spam hunter among you; a user that managed to get 2k rep with lightening speed; you have a local Jon Skeet or the founder of the Ubuntu Foundation, you would like to know a little better?

Its also a more visible way to highlight conclusions from Meta discussion. Like when you want to point out Ask Ubuntu isn't only for GUI-users or want to explain why you guys don't want to see LMGTFY or bare links as answers. Sure these things have been covered on MSO and closed as dupes there many times over. But do you expect new Ubuntu users to know MSO is the main Meta site of Stack Exchange? Its far easier to highlight discussions that are relevant to your community and your community only on your own blog.

Or perhaps you want to explain users how to write better questions, write better answers, make awesome screen recordings, contribute to some open source project or highlight an even that you guys find important. While news is created in a ton of places, who says this is the news you guys want to read? Create your own news instead! Let us know how that event or conference was.

But I agree with Marco, if there's any way to tag-team with an established Ubuntu blog, to highlight some of your own questions as articles as a way to advertise the site, it certainly wouldn't hurt. But then again, why not let them repost your version of the Question of the Week articles? Remember that a blog for the site doesn't necessarily has to attract new users, but can serve as an additional way to make your current users come back to the site.

In the end, I can't decide anything for you guys, just share our own frail experiences with the Super User blog. If you have any questions, feel free to drop by in the Stack Exchange Community Blogs room.

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    This is all great, but it's a matter of time commitment. We'd want to do something right, and that means investing time and energy that we're spending right now on making the site rock. Perhaps in the future or if someone steps up to the plate?
    – Jorge Castro
    Commented Mar 31, 2011 at 14:10
  • It depends on the goals you set yourself @Jorge, I've set up Google Docs with ideas for blog posts and a schedule to try and get them written with some regularity. Here's Fitness Docs and Gamings Docs
    – Ivo Flipse
    Commented Mar 31, 2011 at 14:31
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    Alternatively, you could blog about Ask Ubuntu content for the Super User Blog. As soon as you start to get sufficient content, you can spin it off into an AskUbuntu-only blog.
    – Ivo Flipse
    Commented Apr 4, 2011 at 13:46
  • @IvoFlipse are we supposed to do that though?
    – user595510
    Commented Oct 17, 2016 at 23:37
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If the community is sufficiently motivated to keep the blog up to date, and you feel it will be valuable to the greater Ubuntu-sphere.. then perhaps!

But consider carefully, as a blog is a fairly large unit of work to commit to, and a blog is only "good" if it is updated at least weekly...

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    I think I can provide on tutorial or one post every week (or one in two for sure). If others can also commit, then we can start. Though I would like to see if others are interested too.
    – Manish Sinha
    Commented Mar 18, 2011 at 12:18
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    Actually we can have weekly round-off for most insightful questions for this week or select the highest votes answers along with the question.
    – Manish Sinha
    Commented Mar 19, 2011 at 20:01
  • @Manish Sinha - I like that idea (Of the most insightful questions for the week).
    – jrg
    Commented Mar 22, 2011 at 13:58
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    Yep, hot topics that come up like Firefox 4 and Unity are really going to attract readers.
    – Oxwivi
    Commented Mar 23, 2011 at 12:27
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    I vote for it!!
    – Nathan Osman
    Commented Mar 30, 2011 at 22:55
  • Go for it. I think it will be welcomed.
    – user595510
    Commented Oct 17, 2016 at 23:38
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I do like the idea of a blog and jumped out of my seat saying "YEAH! We should do this", but as I thought more about it I came to the above conclusion.

To be honest I think Ubuntu Blogs have been done to death - it would be hard to compete with say http://omgubuntu.co.uk or http://webupd8.org and the non-stop action of http://planet.ubuntu.com/

Rather I think forming a partnership with the prominent Ubuntu blogs would be a better course of action. Helping to feed them content, have them start using StackTack, and other suck tools to make a symbiotic relationship.

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    Of course if we syndicated the blog on planet ubuntu it would give the site a ton of exposure ...
    – Jorge Castro
    Commented Mar 18, 2011 at 13:26
  • @Jorge we definitely could. I keep sitting on the fence thinking "Dude, we should do this" - then saying - "But, why, what". It works for Super User because there really isn't an authoritative blog for that market. Then I wonder where will this be hosted, how much control will be over the content and site, editors, contributers, so on so forth. I'm still on the fence about this, but I'm interested to see what ideas are out there
    – Marco Ceppi Mod
    Commented Mar 18, 2011 at 13:38
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    Right because after about a month we would realize how much work it is and get tired of it. We can always do guest posts on my blog which is on planet too if we want big bang for little work.
    – Jorge Castro
    Commented Mar 18, 2011 at 18:15
  • @JorgeCastro: @MarcoCeppi How about using my blog (not tooting my own horn here) - but basically we can do the work to link up the other popular guys (as in provide actual links, possible provide rss feeding into sections of our site?) What do you guys think?
    – RolandiXor
    Commented Apr 16, 2011 at 23:29
  • @Roland if there is to be a blog for the AU site it will be run by the SE engine and not offsite
    – Marco Ceppi Mod
    Commented Apr 17, 2011 at 1:08
  • @MarcoCeppi: np
    – RolandiXor
    Commented Apr 17, 2011 at 1:15
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We are now set up to support Stack Exchange Community Blogs. Please see the following for details and guidelines in getting a blog for your community set up:

http://blogoverflow.com/2011/05/18/blogoverflow-com-the-stack-exchange-community-blogging-site/

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