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Death by Blogging By AprillBrandon in Pop Goes the Culture April 14, 2008

And we thought the newsroom atmosphere was stressful.

In "whodathunkit" news today, it seems that blogging can be bad for your health. Yes, with the Internet ever changing the way the world works, it seems the stress of 24/7 information access has been having an adverse effect on hardcore bloggers...specifically death.

According to an April 6 New York Times article, two prolific bloggers have recently kicked the bucket, both dying of heart attacks. It seems the demands on these professional bloggers began to affect their health as they tried to keep up with the digital Joneses.

The article goes on to say that with round the clock news dissemination and a high demand to be the first to break industry news (whether technology, celebrity sports, politics, etc), many paid bloggers are feeling the affects of trying to make sure they never miss a story, which is leading to sleep disorders, weight gain and loss and massive amounts of stress.

I have to admit, the first time I read this, my reaction was "You can get paid good money to blog?...What the...Why am I still in the newsroom?"

But after quickly realizing my boss would probably be reading this, I came to the conclusion that the newsroom is the best place in the world to work and I'm lucky my behind hasn't been fired (right Chris...right?...hello?...crap).

My second reaction was, dare I say, a tad skeptical. I realize that two bloggers recently died, but isn't it stretching it a bit to try and connect them to an epidemic of death by blogging?

Wouldn't a better story be to focus on our overworked, stressed out, multi-tasking day-to-day lives that almost all professions seem to embrace? I mean, out of all of the careers out there I would think blogging in your home office can't quite compare with the stress police officers, or surgeons, or lawyers, or soldiers, or even teachers (especially in this post-crazy 3rd graders planning teacher attacks era) go through day-to-day.

 Not to knock what good bloggers do (note the use of the word "good"...I'm not talking about the bloggers who can barely form a sentence or pass off rumor as fact). But I just don't buy this death by blogging, digital sweatshop picture the New York Times is painting. I think the issue is much larger than a celebrity blogger stressing out that he wasn't the first to break the shocking news of Nicole Richie finally eating a grape.

Maybe we just need to all collectively take a chill pill as a society and realize that world will not, in fact, stop turning if we turned off our Blackberry's for a bit or miss a deadline (not that I ever would, boss...or did last week).

Maybe it's more Death by New Societal Norms than anything else.

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