blogUT vs. UpbeaT, ROUND 1, GO!

Over the past week, I’ve had the pleasure of msn-ing the two editors of blogUT. Julia, Lori and I chatted about life as bloggers. So from today till Friday, I’ll post our conversation in trilogy. Here’s installment 1. Watch as I leave in the middle and leave the co-editors to fend for themselves.

Me:
Julia = Yulya?

Yulya:
haha yeah it’s my russian name

Lori:
lol

Me:
Do you speak Russian?

Yulya:
yup

Me:
Awesome. I wish I spoke Russian.

Me:
So. BlogUT. How did it come about?

Yulya:
JP founded it two years ago. It was mostly a way to connect all of the things going on around campus.

Yulya:
There is so much going on at U of T, but it’s so hard to find out about it, and it’s really easy to get lost. BlogUT was a way of addressing that.

Me:
How do you decide which events to post?

Me:
There are tons of stuff at events.utoronto.ca

Lori:
We post things that we think more people would be interested in

Lori:
rather than very specific things that only a few people would be interested in

Yulya:
a lot of the posts are also generated by our writers, and whta they are interested in

Lori:
We publish most things that they write

Me:
And is JP still contributing to blogUT?

Yulya:
He still contributes now and then and we consult him an many decisions, but I know his job is taking a lot of his time.

Lori:
He enjoys blogging though, so he continues to contribute

Me:
As both of you are full time students, and blogUT is an ec, it must be hard managing time and school work

Lori:
I am actually a part-time student this year, because I am on PEY (co-op)

Lori:
I’m not taking any courses

Me:
How do you juggle work-work, and extra-curricular work?

Lori:
Yeah, it’s kind of irritating because whenever I have to do stuff on campus, I have to go at lunch since things are only open during the day

Yulya:
it must also be a bit difficult blogging about things of interest to the U of T community when you haven’t been on campus in a while… things must not seem as relevant

Lori:
I actually have a lot of free time after work, so it’s not really that difficult, although I am worried about what will happen in September

Me:
And Julia, how do you balance school with blogUT?

Yulya:
That’s really a big problem. When I just joined, JP told me that hte most important thing was setting priorities, and I guess that goes for both BlogUT and school. There are some things that you just know won’t get done, and you get as much as possible done other than that

Me:
Julia – do you find it difficult to find stuff to write about in the summer?

Me:
I know I rack my brain every week to come up with something.

Lori:
I try to keep in the loop by reading your blog, getting newsletters from Hart House, UTSU, etc.

Me:
Hah. Lori answered it, kinda.

Yulya:
Actually I’ve found it easier so far, since I find I’m not limited by having to blog about upcoming events, so I can do the posts I haven’t had time for during the year

Yulya:
plus there’s no school

Me:
(so sorry, gotta run out. Brb in 5, but if you could answer –

Me:
how did you decide to become editor

Me:
how is the blog different now

Lori:
I actually was a blogger for a year. At the beginning of the 2009-2010 school year, I became the finance person, and then one of the editors at the time left in the middle of the year, so I took her place

Lori:
*was a writer

Yulya:
I’ve always loved editing and I’ve been considering it as a career option, so this was a great opportunity.

Yulya:
Every term the body of writers that actively contribute changes slightly, which means that the blog gets refocused to their interests

Lori:
I like writing blogs. I would be happy blogging for a living

Yulya:
Lori, I know you also have a couple of your own blogs. How is writing those different from BlogUT?

Lori:
The blogs I write for myself are mostly about what’s going on in my life

Lori:
the blogs I write for blogUT are about things that UT students would be interested in

Lori:
What about you?

Yulya:
I get a chance to write about topics that don’t fit into BlogUT, which is nice

Lori:
What is the most memorable blog you’ve written?

Yulya:
I think my favourite so far has been the post about the Distillery. It’s my favourite place in Toronto, but not many people know about it. It was great being able to promote it. It also gave me an excuse to go there again

Yulya:
how about you?

Lori:
Yeah I liked that one

Lori:
Mine is the one about makeout spots

Yulya:
that’s still one of our most popular articles

Me:
BACK

Me:
Crisis diverted.

Me:
My bad.

Yulya:
haha yay!

Lori:
Lol

Lori:
It was funny going to all the locations and thinking about the atmosphere and what you could do there

Yulya:
Haha

Lori:
and all the comments people wrote about their favorite locations

Me:
that was an awesome post. Though, I don’t know how unpopulated those quiet spots are now.

Me:
;D

Lori:
LOL

Yulya:
lol