Women rule the blogosphere
Motherhood statement ... Mamamia blogger Mia Freedman.
Men might have invented the internet but it's women who have really taken to it as a tool for communication. Nicky Park explores the expanding world of the "mummy-blog".
Former Cosmo editor Mia Freedman posts about fashion, celebrity, relationships and current affairs on her popular blog, mamamia.
But a recent post about dishing up cold frozen vegies and canned tuna for her family dinner, posted in the "motherhood" section, triggered more comments than another article.
"The comments exploded with people talking about their meals that they cook and how they love tuna and rice," Freedman says.
"It was one of those real community, sharing moments."
After a 15-year career in women's magazines, Freedman fled the "office politics" and in mid-2007 started her blog, mamamia.com.au.
The blog attracts about 300,000 hits every month, the vast majority of them women who engage in debates on everything from whether women should sacrifice careers for children, to Madonna's latest adoption bid.
"I found as I rose my way through the ranks of magazines I became further and further away from what I loved doing, which is communicating with an audience," she said.
"I liked the idea of that instant communication with no filter between me and an audience.
"It's turned into the magazine of the future", Freedman said, who posts six times a day on the site while raising her three young kids and juggling other work commitments including TV appearances and a regular newspaper column.
"It's just grown organically and it's just in the last 12-months it's really taken off."
Freedman says her site acts as a "watercooler" for mothers to share their thoughts.
"It can be quite isolating being a stay-at-home mother, or a mother working part-time or just a mother being up at three o'clock in the morning with a baby that won't sleep," she said.
"Because we've lost that sense of community with our neighbours and with our extended families, people are finding it online."
"I find in a lot of ways the more trivial (the post)... the more interested people can be."
She said the "mummy-blog" phenomenon is booming in Australia, following the lead of the pioneering US mummy blog, dooce.com, which attracts more than 4 million hits a month - bigger than any magazine in the world.
The blog is the creation of a feisty ex-mormon named Heather B Armstrong, a self-described "Stay at Home Mom (SAHM) or a Shit Ass Ho Mother******", who was famously sacked for posting about her work on her blog.
Freedman says blogging offers mums an outlet for the "complicated, interesting, worthy work" that they do, as well as being a "big normaliser" for readers.
"Even though to some people that might seem really menial and trivial, it's a way for people to express themselves and talk about what's going on in their lives."
Online entrepreneur and single mum, Claudia Keech, is one of Australia's early adopters. She launched Australia's first online magazine for mums, MotherInc.com.au, about a decade ago.
She said women today are looking beyond the traditional mother's group.
"Sometimes you need, at two in the morning, to know you can contact someone else when you're (thinking), `I'm not coping'," Keech said.
"I was seeing through my own experiences (at mother's group) that we all needed somebody to converse with, not just each other.
"Mothers today are isolated at home, we've got families in other countries, in other states, it's not like you poke your head over the fence and there's someone just like you."
Aussie mummy-blogger, Chantelle Ellem, was feeling isolated when her newborn baby wouldn't sleep through the night.
"I think being a mum, you're so involved in your own life and your children ... it can be quite isolating," Ellem said from her home in Sydney's eastern suburbs.
The 28-year-old began keeping a private blog to keep her hands busy during lengthy breast feeding sessions.
She decided to go public with her thoughts on fatmumslim.com.au in January this year. Today, she gets between 300 and 400 hits a day.
"I sometimes don't realise that other people read what I write and I think, why are they interested in that?," Ellem, who also works as a nanny, said.
She has "always been an open book", and posts anecdotes and photos of her one-year-old daughter, "Miss Lacey", and vents about her desire to slim down.
Her "monthly matra" reads: "Losing weight is hard. Not losing weight is hard. Choose your hard."
"I pretty much share anything," she said.
Ellem, who has always kept a diary, said she gets support and tips from her readers.
In return, readers realise they aren't alone.
"You can go online and see that other people are thinking the same thing ... it's not easy being a mum.
"They (mums) can really relate ... it's such a nice feeling to know that other people are going through (what you are).
"You're really alone ... so it's nice to be able to share."
How to start your own blog:
You don't have to be tech-savy to start a mummy-blog of your own - check out free platforms like blogspot to set something up.
- Write honestly and passionately but don't reveal any personal information that might risk your safety.
- Over time, ads on your blog can make a bit of money, but go in with a passion to share your thoughts, not dollar-signs in your eyes.
For more on parenting and pregnancy: www.essentialbaby.com.au
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