We've all been there before. The "New Blogger on the block", putting out our writing and hoping that somehow we will be seen on the large, impersonal internet. Somehow, we make it to the point where our articles are read.

This is one reason why I am so fond of JoeUser's format. My articles receive a wide readership here, while I would be struggling to promote them on other sites. If I write an article, my work ranks high in the google search engines on the subject matter because of the prominence of the site.

But new bloggers to JU are just as lost, and often as unread as many others on the internet. We may occasionally wander across their work in the recent forum posts, but many of us, with time pressing, fail to catch the majority of quality pieces of these newer bloggers.

So I would encourage you as we enter a new year to look at the work of some of our newer bloggers. Two suggestions I would give on where to start are DJBandit, whose comments on others' articles indicate that he's a writer with a LOT to give to this blogging community, and trueandfree (Link ), who has blogged repeatedly on an appalling and underrecognized case of injustice that is dragging on in the courts.

I don't have enough time online to revive the "A Blogger You All Should Know" series (YET), but would like to encourage each of you as the new year arrives to pick up these newer blogs and give them a quick look. I scouted out TexasWahine when I started the series, and she's gone on to become one of JU's most prominent bloggers. While I don't claim it was my own doing (the quality of her writing stands on its own), I probably wouldn't have noticed her as quickly (and, as longtime readers know, some of the circumstances in my life might be VASTLY different).

So make a commitment: one new blog per week. Not only are you helping newer bloggers by reading them, but you just might be helping yourself in ways you could have never imagined.