Do you know what the first ever blog was?

According to the internet, it was Links.net, created in 1994 by Justin Hall. In those very early days of the internet, having your own blog was the only way to have a personal presence on the web.

You're probably aware that a few things have changed since 1994. Writers now have to decide whether to start their own blog to use as their primary platform, or use one of the many social platforms.

Since taking the Ship 30 for 30 writing course, I've been thinking more about these two distinct pathways for starting to write online.

Option #1: Start a blog on your own website

This pathway might otherwise be known as the David Perell pathway. In his popular writing course and his free long read Ultimate Guide to Writing Online, he advocates for writers creating their own blog.

This puts you in control of SEO, the way in which your content is presented and will be around as long as the internet is, so long as you're willing to maintain it.

Perell makes the point that it's better to have a central place to point readers to than a series of different platforms with various ways of presenting your content. He calls out Medium specifically for its poor SEO, monetisation and reader retention. But he also acknowledges Medium's ready made audience, who are all there, looking for something to read. This leads nicely into Option 2.

Option #2: Use existing social platforms

This second option could be described as the Ship 30 pathway. The course leaders Dickie and Cole argue strongly for using platforms like Twitter, Medium and LinkedIn to publish writing over starting your own blog.

Their main reason for this is distribution, the point being that readers just won't find a reason to find themselves on your blog. But with Twitter, for example, you can persuade readers to engage with your writing during their pre-existing lunchtime scroll down the timeline. The audience is already there. Audiences on social networks are more difficult to keep engaged though - you have more competition for attention and you have less of direct line to them than if they subscribed to your blog via email, for example.

The rise of platforms like Substack and Twitter-owned Revue means writers increasingly have the opportunity to build an audience, keep it, reach them directly via email and even transfer their details to another service via an Excel export.

Which option would you take?