Four Years of Blogging: Why Experience-Based Writing Survived the AI Era

Four Years of Blogging: Why Experience-Based Writing Survived the AI Era

I​’m preparing a blog post reflecting on my fourth year of blogging and looking back on which types of content actually became hits. Looking back, I realize that it was a blessing in disguise that I didn’t write too many purely informational posts. When I was blogging most actively in 2021, ChatGPT did not exist. At that time, many blogs focused on IT and technical explanations—coding, Photoshop tutorials, and other specialized technical content. But once ChatGPT arrived, those types of blogs seem to have lost much of their appeal.

Of course, my blog also contains that kind of content. In the Info menu, I organized the IT skills that artists often need and explained them in detail. Now that I think about it, what I did well was taking the perspective of visual thinkers. I used a lot of screenshots and wrote step-by-step instructions with care. Without this approach, I think those posts wouldn’t have had much traction. It created a clear point of differentiation from ChatGPT. Even now, my posts that explain software clearly and visually remain popular. Some of them even addressed critical errors in Weebly—image overwriting issues, board malfunctions, saving problems—which helped a lot of people.

https://www.annakoh.com/info/image-overwriting-error-in-weebly

Interestingly, that was the direction I originally planned to take. At the time, Photoshop was extremely popular, and I wrote down new methods and techniques I learned while using it. But the popularity of that type of content has been steadily declining. People now use AI features to generate images, and modern Photoshop includes AI tools that accomplish, with just a few commands, tasks that used to require many layers and complex steps. Because of this shift, I rarely write about Photoshop anymore.
Since my blog is centered on my life as an artist and my artworks, the writing naturally drifted toward experience-based storytelling—as if I were casually sharing my daily life. I think this shift is actually what has kept my blog alive all this time. When I first opened my blog, I wanted to write professionally about art or technical skills. It felt straightforward: study something, summarize it, and post it. During the year and a half I was in graduate school, I posted many such informational pieces.
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https://www.annakoh.com/blog/category/adelphi-university

​Reflecting on four years of blogging, this post explores how technical tutorials lost traction in the age of AI while experience-driven, personal storytelling gained strength. A look at why visual, step-by-step guides still matter, how artist-centered writing created lasting connection, and why deeply personal blogs will thrive in the future.

But as I continued blogging for a long period, I found that I no longer wrote only dry, information-heavy posts. Writing itself became enjoyable, and the posts gradually became more experience-centered. They turned into streams of consciousness, daily reflections, shifting perspectives on the world, resolutions as an artist, and the story of change in my life. Over time, my blog became less about information and more about experience and thought. And surprisingly, these were the posts that started resonating with people. Some readers genuinely connect with them.

I believe that in the age of AI, the way for blogs to survive is through deeper personalization—stories rooted in individual experience and self-expression. And I think that in the future, everyone will have a blog just as everyone now has a phone. With that vision in mind, I want to keep blogging with intention.
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As I continue blogging, I find myself more interested in invisible value and intangible assets. I care less about striking it rich quickly and more about enjoying my steady daily life. I’ve come to believe in the power of documentation and writing. Writing clarifies my thoughts and helps me live more intentionally. As an artist, it strengthens my brand. When I first opened my blog, I wrote for myself, but now I feel that my writing helps not only other artists but also people outside the field. That’s why I will continue writing. I truly believe that blogs will hold even more power in this era.