Abusing (and using) the blog

Sorry folks, I'm abusing my blog for research purposes by embedding the video below. It's an example of a military blog making the news, so I wanted to make sure I didn't lose track of it.

It's about Col Sgt Michael Saunders (2 Mercian) who has been blogging while on deployment in Afghanistan. I wrote a piece which included a reference to his blog for the Frontline last week. I missed the fact that his pub/blog posts had made the news back in April because I was preparing for a conference.

The great thing about blogging is that when you post stuff up people get in touch with you, and I was really pleased to get an email from Mike's brother, Tracey Tyrls, who features in video. I've been following that up this morning.

(Beats working on interview transcribing. Yesterday I finally wrapped up several days work on one that came to 18,908 words. I am left wondering how the people at Hansard transcribe sessions of parliament and remain sane).

British soldier blogging the Iraq war?

It looks as though Universal Soldier is going to start some sort of retrospective blog of the Iraq war. He's written a teasing little post taking us all the way back to Autumn 2002 and the build up to war in Iraq.

Blogging so long after the event does mean you lose one of the crucial publishing advantages of the medium: immediacy. But I haven't come across any British milblogs that blog regularly and immediately from the front line in the way that US soldiers do, so I'll be sitting, watching, and waiting, for future posts.

British blog post from Afghanistan

Hardlyablog is one of the few British milblogs I've come across. He's serving with the TA in Afghanistan. He mainly describes life around the base. Here's an edited extract from his latest post:

"Waved Olly off from his final tour last night. Since he is leaving the army we tried to organise a surprise final meal for him on Tuesday....Just as the food got on the table the rocket alarms went off and then kept going off with various warnings for 3 more hours until the all clear was given so meal ate in a bunker. Then Long Way Round rigged up in the bunker on a long cable and projector from the office and some wine acquired off the French to celebrate his departure. Luckily we weren’t caught by the enjoyment police or indeed the military police as I don’t think they would have been impressed with the level of seriousness we applied to the situation."