We survey the new landscape of online self-publishing that has taken Zimbabwe by storm.

When I was a kid growing up in Bulawayo I woke up one morning to find that the Sunday News- that City’s biggest Sunday newspaper at the time- had published one of the short stories I had submitted to them. I was thrilled.

That was in 1995 and I was in Upper 6 then. As any writer will testify, to find an outlet for one’s work is an ultimate aspiration.

In a time when the printed word was, well, the printed word- it was exhilarating to get printed- and I suppose, thirteen years later, in 2008, it still is.

But it’s so much easier now. All one has to do is log on to the Internet, go to a free blogging service (e.g. blogspot.com), click a few links and voilà you have become a writer and a publisher all in one.

Around the world, a new blog is set up every half second (CNET.com). That’s about 175,000 new blogs every day and Zimbabweans are in that number.

Zi.Report estimates that there are over two hundred million blogs around the world. Politics, art, technology, motivation and leadership. No subject escapes the uncensored world of blogging.

Zimbabwean activists like Comrade Fatso, Bev Clarke, Daniel Molokele, have used their blogs as bastions of defiance against a tyrannical regime. Motivational speakers and leadership coaches like Jonah Mungoshi and Milton Kamwendo etch inspiration onto the pages of their blogs. Corporate captains like Geoff Goss of Celsys Limited and Nigel Chanakira of Kingdom Meikles Africa have recently harnessed the power of this new medium to bring a new twist to the idea of investor relations.

With so many blogs out there, you’d wonder who is reading them. But, it seems the world is watching, including international media giants. Recently Comrade Fatso was asked by CNN to blog for them on the situation in Zimbabwe. News agencies such as BBC and Al Jazeera have quoted Zimbabwean political blogs in their coverage.

Many of the bloggers in Zimbabwe have been moved by the dire political and economic situation to find an outlet for their angst, anger and frustration. You will find therefore that most Zimbabwean blogs are political.

The power of the blog is that it escapes the censorship of an editor and the limitation of the editorial policy of a big media publishing house. That is also its weakness. As there is no censorship and as it is so easy to publish content to a blog you will find that a lot of blogs out there are utter rubbish- but then again one man’s meat…

Below is a list of some noteworthy Zimbabwean blogs to get you started on your blogsphere journey:

Business

• Nigel Chanakira: http://kingdommeikles.blogspot.com/
• Geoff Goss: http://celsys.blogspot.com/
• Milton Kamwendo: http://www.innov8motivation.blogspot.com/
• Jonah Mungoshi: http://wealthcreationafrica.blogspot.com/
• SpectrumITS: http://spectrumits.com/blog/
• Oscar Manduku: http://cozvaitasei.blogspot.com/

Politics & Activism

• Daniel Molokele: http://danielmolokele.blogspot.com/
• Sokwanele: http://www.sokwanele.com/thisiszimbabwe/
• Comrade Fatso: http://www.comradefatso.vox.com/
• Comrade Fatso on CNN:http://edition.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/africa/05/14/zimbabwe.blog/index.html
• The Bearded Man: http://thebeardedman.blogspot.com/
• Kubatana Blogs: http://kubatanablogs.net/kubatana/
• Message from Zimbabwe: http://www.messagefromafrica.com/

Personal

• Milton Kamwendo: http://www.miltonkamwendo.blogspot.com/
• Farai Sevenzo: http://www.faraisevenzo.blogspot.com/

Literary & the Arts

• Fungai James Tichawangana: www.fungaijames.com/bloggen/
• Valerie Tagwira: http://valerietagwira.wordpress.com/
• Petina Gappah: http://petinagappah.blogspot.com/
• Christopher Mlalazi: http://www.chris-writingseriously.blogspot.com/