One day @ the BCET Bloggers Workshop

WebReps Team went to Durgapur to attend BCET Bloggers Workshop yesterday, i.e., October 31, 2009. It was a great day for me? Why?

1] I was eager to take a day off from work – and finally it happened.
2] I love long journey by car.
3] I love to spend time with friends, like-minded of course.
4] It was the second event of WebReps.
5] I haven’t heard of any Blogging Workshop in India earlier; so perhaps this is the FIRST Blogging Workshop in the country (Thanks Anirban for pointing this out). And BCET with WebReps made a history on October 31, 2009.
6] Popularizing blogging among students is what I want to do.
7] I was damn sure that Kamanashish would stop at Shaktigarh and you know the reason – we bought Langcha (an indigenous sweetmeat).

The workshop was delayed due to some reasons – some of the students had internal exams and there was some political tension as well. But when we finally entered the seminar hall, around 70 students were present there including those from nearby colleges.

Kamanashish started with the introductory presentation “Why Blog?” here is the list of sessions:

1] Why Blog – by Kamanashish Roy
2] Blog Setup – Technical aspects – by Prabhanjan Panigrahi
3] How to get more traffic? – by Kamanashish Roy
4] Sponsors Slot – SEO Training Presentation by Softz Solutions

---Half an hour break for lunch at the College Canteen---

5] Interaction with the students – their blogs, views and ideas
6] Social Media and Micro-blogging – by Arjun Ghosh
7] Make some Money dude – Blog Monetization – by Kamanashish Roy

All the sessions went very well – students participated whole-heartedly, they asked questions like pros, it seemed as if we were discussing with professional and expert bloggers! Even those who did not know what blogging was, picked it up amazingly fast.

And at the end of the workshop, I felt as if it was a day-long lesson for me – what I revealed was:

This generation has already started blogging. When we started, we followed western bloggers and probably we could not get out of the trend of blog monetization – but these boys and girls are more eager to get their voice heard – their own views on various political and social aspects, personal experiences, software, books, movies – these are the topics young bloggers like most!

And I was amazed to see how creative they were with their blog titles! A lot of young bloggers are interested in using Hindi, Bengali and Sanskrit terms in the blog titles – Unlike Web Wings and More Doubts – they use Abhibyakti, Lipi, Anuranan, Sa'matri'yoni (how brilliantly Sayoni inserted her name in the blog title Sa'matri'yoni), Arham, Dorpon and MANY MORE.

Like BCET bloggers, I am sure, most young bloggers will have the courage to break all the conventions and come up with their very own creative ideas. Hats off to BCET bloggers!