Bloggasm

The New York Times has managed to find three bloggers recently who have either suffered or died of heart attacks and concluded (in an open ended wishy washy way) that full-time blogging is so stressful that it’s deadly. It then goes on to quote TechCrunch founder Michael Arrington:

“I haven’t died yet,” said Michael Arrington, the founder and co-editor of TechCrunch, a popular technology blog. The site has brought in millions in advertising revenue, but there has been a hefty cost. Mr. Arrington says he has gained 30 pounds in the last three years, developed a severe sleeping disorder and turned his home into an office for him and four employees. “At some point, I’ll have a nervous breakdown and be admitted to the hospital, or something else will happen.”

As someone who tries to exercise regularly, I don’t understand it when people who work from home say that their health has gotten worse because of it. The reason that I’m not able to exercise more often and eat healthier is because I often, as a newspaper reporter, work late into the night covering meetings, meaning on those nights I can’t work out and I end up eating fast food. If I were able to work from home, my health would improve, not worsen, because I could take time out of my day to cook, exercise, or go on a walk.

Arrington has several bloggers working for him. If he’s so worried about someone scooping him during the night (and btw, how many tech deals happen in the middle of the night? In the article it makes it sound that by not being up at 2 a.m. he’s going to miss out on some Microsoft merger), then why doesn’t he just hire someone to work a night shift? Some of the other tech blogs do this.

This is just one of the NY Times famous “trend setter” stories. Where they form a thesis, and then move forward with the research based on the assumption that the thesis is true, that it’s a trend.