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# On liveblogging and #likeminds
- URL: https://onemanandhisblog.com/2010/11/on_liveblogging_and_likeminds/
- Published: 2010-11-01T17:29:17.000Z
- Updated: 2015-04-28T12:57:03.000Z
- Author: Adam Tinworth
- Tags: Blogging, like minds, liveblogging

Some people have been saying some very kind things about my [liveblogging of Like Minds](http://www.onemanandhisblog.com/archives/business/like%5Fminds/?ref=onemanandhisblog.com) last week:

@\[adders\](http://twitter.com/adders) your coverage of \[#likeminds\](http://twitter.com/search?q=%23likeminds "#likeminds") was incredible – how do you do that? Superfast and insightful \[http://bit.ly/9DAFsd\](http://bit.ly/9DAFsd)\[less than a minute ago\](http://twitter.com/#!/MickDickinson/status/29179325483 "Sat Oct 30 12:36:31 +0000 2010") via \[TweetDeck\](http://www.tweetdeck.com)\[!\[\]()\](http://twitter.com/MickDickinson)\*\*\[Mick Dickinson\](http://twitter.com/MickDickinson)\*\* MickDickinson 

There’s two answers to his question: passion and practice.

The second is the easier one to address: I’ve been liveblogging events since 2005-ish, and half a decade’s practice, mistakes, successes and experimentation makes a difference. There’s a post to be written at some point about how I liveblog and what kit I use, but that will probably have to wait until after my next big liveblogging appointment: \[Le Web in Paris\](http://www.leweb.net/), where I’m one of their official bloggers. 

Passion is the harder one. My wife refers to my liveblogging as “taking notes for the class” – betraying her university lecturer view of the world a little – and I think she’s spot on. Back in my reporting days, it always used to annoy me that I had to compress all the great material covered at conferences I attended in 300 to 700 words. You could never more than skim the surface of the event. I was always a prolific note-taker at conferences, and from there it was only a short step to taking those notes \*in public\*. In my notebook, or in my MacBook these days, the notes are only useful to me. On a blog, they’re useful to the whole community, whether or not they were at the event. And that feels like a worthwhile use of my time.

It helps, I think, that I’m the sort of person who thinks things through most effectively when writing them down. So not only is liveblogging a conference useful to the community, it’s useful to me.

But, truthfully, it’s an addictive high for me. I just love doing it. It’s probably an endorphin-rush thing, the narcotic power of the deadline magnified to the umpteenth degree. A day’s liveblogging leaves me tired, a bit dazed and (always) thirsty – but dammit, I enjoy it.