Today is a big day for me. Not that you have to care, but it’s something that I can proudly take to the grave because not too many people can say that they’ve blogged for two decades.

Back when I started, I never imagined that “blogging” would have staying power. Much less that I would be one of the very few that would stick with it from among the handful of pioneers that started out back in that dawning era.

When I started blogging, I had launched my first website – RealCorporateLawyer.com – for RR Donnelley just a year earlier. I was reading a marketing magazine and it included an esoteric article about something called “blogging.” And I thought to myself, “who would want to read my diary?” I wouldn’t want to read my own diary.

Because that’s how the article pitched the concept, that the blogger would essentially use the software to give periodic updates about one’s own life. Back when I started in 2002, there were only a handful of blogs out there – and perhaps no other lawyer blogging about the law (although there were a couple of blogs about legal marketing). The term “blog” didn’t exist in our everyday vernacular. It was a nascent concept.

So after I put down the magazine, I conducted some online research – probably using “Ask Jeeves” or “Dogpile”; not even Google – and downloaded the blogging software. A college kid worked for me as an intern – and it took him two weeks to install and get the blogging software working properly. It wasn’t a turnkey process like it is today.

My writing style for the first few months – and years – of blogging were quite rudimentary. I had no examples to look to as for what might work best. The blogging software didn’t suggest that your entry have a title. It really was software for a diary.

Here’s what that first month of blogging looked like – Sarbanes-Oxley was just coming down the pike so my foray into quasi-journalism was timely. Here’s to twenty more years. Cheers!

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Photo of Broc Romanek Broc Romanek

As a strategist for the firm’s Corporate & Securities practice, Broc Romanek has a deep understanding of the regulatory and environmental, social, and governance (ESG) marketplace. Prior to joining Perkins Coie, Broc served as editor at TheCorporateCounsel.net, CompensationStandards.com, and DealLawyers.com, where he oversaw…

As a strategist for the firm’s Corporate & Securities practice, Broc Romanek has a deep understanding of the regulatory and environmental, social, and governance (ESG) marketplace. Prior to joining Perkins Coie, Broc served as editor at TheCorporateCounsel.net, CompensationStandards.com, and DealLawyers.com, where he oversaw and managed coverage on issues related to ESG, corporate governance, executive pay, deals, and market trends and analysis.

In addition to his nearly two decades of working as a journalist and publisher, Broc served as assistant general counsel at a Fortune 50 company, worked in the Office of Chief Counsel of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission’s (SEC) Division of Corporation Finance, was a counselor to former SEC Commissioner Laura Unger, and worked in private practice. He also is the author, or co-author, of four legal treatises, and has authored several books focused on the legal industry.