Check out Robert’s post here.

My answer was so long I thought I’d make it the subject of this post:

Robert, thanks for this post and inviting me to comment. This evolution has been frustrating to watch and live over the years.

As you know I’ve blogged for over 6 years, and have maintained multiple blogs. I currently maintain three of my own.

I also wrote a book on LinkedIn (I’m on LinkedIn – Now What???), coauthored a book on Facebook (I’m on Facebook – Now What???) and have done numerous live presentations, videos etc, on things like blogging, Twitter, etc.

Six years ago I wanted comments on my posts. When social became bigger, the comments went away because people would “comment” about my post on Facebook, or Twitter, or elsewhere. It was messing everything up :p

But I continued blogging… through all the social eruption.

Or should I say distraction.

I’ve seen Google not care about social posts (comments, walls, discussions, etc.) like they care about (or track) my posts. If I google certain keywords I find my posts from years ago, but never a tweet or discussion or wall post. The chatter that happened in social is… GONE.

If I were to leave this comment on your FB page only a small handful of people would ever see it. I could not refer back to it, ever (especially years/months later). But on this post it lives forever (as long as your blog doesn’t go down). That’s really powerful. I continue to send people links to my posts that are years-old.

What I’ve seen recently (in the last 18 months) is that people are getting really tired of all the places they “have to” be… LI, FB, Twitter were the Big Three. Oh but get on Google+ or you are a loser who is missing out! And Pinterest is better than them all! And what about ____ and ____ and ____!!!! It is just too much, and people don’t have time for it, nor do they have the energy.

That’s why you see people “going dark,” or “taking a one month social fast.” It’s just too much.

Where should you blog? On your blog. For years I’ve called my blog(s) the “anchor of my comprehensive social marketing strategy.” It continues to be. Even if I hit a grandslam elsewhere (like a LinkedIn Answers question) I’ll link to it from my blog, so it lives forever and can be accessed later.

The next best place, right now (and this could change but I don’t see anything that is near good enough to be a close second) is LinkedIn Group Discussions. They don’t live forever, but you have a built-in audience that might care about what you are talking about (which bloggers don’t necessarily have)…

Anyway, my two cents. Can’t wait to see where we’ll be in another six years