On Blogging

Well, I came across a pretty interesting article about blogging. You should read it.

Here's a quote:

The [Huffington] Post wasn’t some site thrown up by a smart, bored Williamsburg hipster who just happened to hit a cultural nerve. It was the product of a corporation—carefully planned, launched, and promoted. This is now the model for success: Of Technorati’s top ten blogs, nearly half were created in the same corporate fashion, part of the twin blog empires of Jason Calacanis and Nick Denton.

“The good news is that it’s still possible to create a top-ranked blog,” says Shirky. “The bad news is, the way to get into the top ten now seems to be public relations.”

I think it's too bad to see this happening, but I don't think it's the only movement in the Blogoshpere. I think that the small blogs will continue to serve an important role, and the readership of blogs has barely even started to expand. In my school (and college age, especially college aged kids who go to a school like I do, is a prime advertising group) barely anyone reads blogs regularly. I'm considered a bit of a nerd for the ammount of time I spend on it, but I love it, so I'm not going to stop. However, once people like us students wake up and start reading, they'll be room for anyone. Plus, the small-time blogs will be a better place for discussion, because of the sheer number of bloggers. I think we'll see a lot more blog-communities comprised of people who stumbled across one another, and who continue a discussion on their various sites.

That's just my two cents. I got into this because I was always e-mailing my friends to point them to articles, and then explain what they meant. Plus I'm a total political geek, and I love to discuss this stuff. I'll take any money my google adds send my way, but that's not the reason I'm keeping the blog up. I'm in this for the cross-blog discussion, and for the random connections that I can make with people. So yeah...there are a couple of people who've made the first two months of my blog really exciting...and you know who you are, so thanks...

That was a little more sentimental than I planned on getting, but whatever, it's Valentine's Day. I don't exactly get to enjoy it, however, since I've got a three or four hour econ problem set to get through...but I'll make it eventually.