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Blog Binging Gorges the Net
Site Pixie writes "Most blogs are created by someone you don’t know, often about something you don’t care about, but that hasn’t stopped ‘blogging’ from becoming a remarkably ubiquitous phenomenon. There are even blogs about blogs such as The Blog Herald. It looks like everyone wants their fifteen minutes of fame online. Estimates put the number of blogs to be in the tens of millions, with several factors influencing the count, such as whether a blog is available for public or private consumption. Carl Bialik investigates the intricacies of counting blogs, and shows how blog indexing sites like BlogPulse and Technorati are bursting at the seams with thousands of new blog entries everyday."
Just another internet fad (though useful to some degree, if they're good).
But may I suggest rather than blog, we could call them blahgs, or even blah-blah-blahgs.
Carl Bialik investigates the intricacies of counting blogs, and shows how blog indexing sites like BlogPulse and Technorati are bursting at the seams with thousands of new blog entries everyday.
Technorati has always been slow for me and somewhat outdated. Google's Blogsearch, OTOH, seems fairly current and loads much faster.
I have only seen a few hits from Technorati (ending up at my site) but quite a few more coming from Google, starting only in the last 10 days or so.
Blogs are turning into the second spam of the internet. Some of them are legitimate and interesting, but a vast majority are not.
Beware he who would deny you access to information, for in his heart he dreams himself your master. -Anonymous
Blogs are glorified web pages are they not?
Just like podcasting used to be called --- audio files, duh!
My dictionary lists "binging" as an acceptable spelling, but it took me a couple of extra parses on this (not least because "gorges" can be a noun as well as a verb.)
I still don't, ya know, CARE, but at least I understand the headline.
I'm a crabby old guy resistant to jargon.
The word "blogs", esp. blogger (and all derived words) have rubbed me the wrong way from the beginning -- especially when we have words like "write" and "writer."
Thankfully, I've found this guy who really says it all better than I can.
http://www.thebricktestament.com/the_law/when_to_
News for merdes. Shit that matters.
Ask me about my sig.
Apparently if I create a web page and upload some text to it, that's not a blog. But if I use an idiot proof content-management system to "type" my web page instead of "coding" it, I'm then creating a blog.
Once you start putting pictures and links on your blog, you're making a webpage...
------ The best brain training is now totally free : )
Heed your own advice, buddy.
News for merdes. Shit that matters.
Ask me about my sig.
It's really hard to measure blogs from a number of angles. Everyone always claims that your data is biased and there's still debate over what a 'blog' actually is... Feedburner is in a good place to measure blogs. I blogged about their stats last week.
There's also a lot of debate on the quality of various Blog search engines such as Technorati, Feedster, and IceRocket. I'm thinking of creating a meta indexer which simply monitors 100 real blogs at 1-5 minute intervals and then determines how quickly the blog search engines index them.
I'd love help if anyone's interested. I just don't have much time......
Ten years ago, people called blogs homepages.
"Blogs" are in reality just easy-to-setup homepages. Without the geeks/nerds making it easy for people to set things up with sites like Blogger.com, blogs wouldn't be as popular as it is today. Many bloggers today can't even write a line of HTML.
I maintain a site run via WordPress, that publishes an RSS feed. However, I don't use it to write about my (uninteresting to most of the universe) day to day life. Rather, I write semi-technical articles about subjects people might be interested in.
No doubt this is lumped in with the "blogs". However, it's just an extension of what I've done for years, but now I don't have to write static HTML pages and FTP them around. I using weblog software as a content management system and RSS to let people know when I've "published" something. Comments on the system allow me to get feedback and questions that everyone can see, rather than have me privately answer the same thing 10 times from my Inbox.
I would state that this categorically isn't a "blog", just a more useful incarnation of what people have been putting on the web for years. I'm pretty sure many other "blogs" are like mine (heck, looking at my RSS list, 99% will be better).
The internet has always been full of garbage (or, more PC'ly, "stuff I'm not interested in"). Just ignore it if you don't like it, and focus on the stuff you do like.
I agree it is hard to count blogs....please see my blog for more information.
He who knows best knows how little he knows. - Thomas Jefferson
"Most blogs are created by someone you don't know, often about something you don't care about, but that hasn't stopped 'blogging' from becoming a remarkably ubiquitous phenomenon.
Most web pages, emails, usenet posts, instant messages, SMSes, books, magazines, newspapers, pamphlets, and indeed, spoken words are created by people I don't know, often about things I don't care about, and that hasn't stopped any of them from becoming remarkably ubiquitous.
I don't understand why people think blogging is different from any of the above.
It looks like everyone wants their fifteen minutes of fame online.
That's a crass assumption. Most do it because they enjoy doing it. Some do it because they want to make money. Some do it because all of their friends are doing it. People have a lot of different reasons. I seriously doubt that "fame", even fifteen minutes of it on the web, is a real motivator for all but a tiny but vocal minority.
Don't become a regular here -- you will become retarded.
Also, water is wet. Food satisfies hunger.
Can we have more of these content-free statements of the blindingly obvious, please?
Slashdot subscribers, please stand up so that I can laugh at you.
-b
myselfmusic
And I, for one, would like to wholeheartedly agree with the underlying meaning of it. :-)
I have a weblog. I don't use it to look for fame; I use it to communicate experiences with friends and family, with the added feature that others who want information about what it's like to have these experiences may read my weblog to do so.
:-(.) We called it "a development log." Why do new words have to be invented for something, especially when they are just the lazy contraction of existing words that work perfectly well?
I find it a lot more effective than getting on the phone with various family members and friends in different time zones and repeating the same stories over and over again. It allows those who are interested to find out what's going on when they want to, and allows me to communicate any updates when I want to.
And I agree, the word "blog" is annoying, and, as far as I can tell, purely a media construct. Back in the day, when I was doing game development, I used to post a monthly development log on progress on the game. (Unforutnately, it's been lost to the mists of time - even the Wayback Machine can't get to it
Don't underestimate the power of The Source
Imagine if all the man-power being used to complain about people not bringing clean water to starving children was instead used to bring clean food to thirsty children.
often about something you don't care about
But that's the point. You ignore those, I read the ones that talk about things you are interested in.
Coder's Stone: The programming language quick ref for iPad
Wow, the submitter seems to think that blogs are worthless, yet it's a huge phenomenon, and seems puzzled as to why. I've seen this attitude before--it's common on Slashdot--but it's misguided. A weblog is simply someone posting their thoughts on a topic that interests them. It could be links to other sites, it could be software development, it could be graphic arts, it could be TV commercials, it could simply be what appear to be mundane details about daily life. The key is that you ignore what you don't care about. The mundane detail blogs are intended for family and friends (but could still be read by anyone who might want to). The graphic arts blogs are likely only of interest to other graphic artists. Slashdot-types might like software development blogs, Linux advocacy blogs, OS X blogs, and so on. There's no need to be cynical just because other people are writing about topics you have no interest in.
Why are people so worried about blogs corrupting the Internet, anyway? I don't understand the problem. If Google happens to turn up my blog in a search for something, and my listing is distracting people from finding "reputable sources", then how reputable could said sources really be? I mean, if someone's silly blog like mine has a higher pagerank than someone's site, then I feel like the problem is theirs, not mine. Seriously. You probably need to work on your site content, if a lowly personal blog can get listings ahead of yours.
And I speak of myself as an example only as example. Because I know full well my blog doesn't threaten the Internet in any way. There's more traffic in a ghost town. Mine is little more than a gripe-list, and way for my family to see I'm still alive without needing to call me.
If you hate blogs, then don't read them. But why do so many people feel they are polluting the WWW?
VOTE!
According to Wikipedia, the world population as of 6/2005 is 6.45 billion. The democratic nature of blogging indicates that it is possible some day every single person on earth will have at least one blog, so the blog counting is unlikely to stop until it reaches 6.45 billion, that is, if some day all nations become democratic.
The "relevance" and "importance" issues mentioned by the Wall Street Journal article miss the point -- blogging is all about democracy and free speech. The human desire to self-express is unstoppable.
Sun and Fun
It would be interesting to know how many people don't blog for fame-- blogging for personal or practicle reasons. Quite honestly, a blog is often better than a notebook. You can update your blog from any computer. Blogs are hard to lose. They don't fall apart after months of use. And you can read a blog anywhere on the internet.
I have four personal blogs just for that reason-- a wine blog because I have problems remember that great wine I had last year, a photo blog because it's easier to blog photos than it is to email them to friends, a house maintenance blog because damned if I can remember the last time I replaced the furnance filters, and a generic personal blog.
I don't consider this "blog spam" I don't hype or advertise them. Yes they are public, but it's easier to have a public blog, than a private blog for a dozen or so people. And, they are just so damn convienent.
My corporate firewall blocks anything slightly resembling a blog or higher.
Now that doesn't piss me off because I can't go read a bunch of morons thoughts on things that don't concern me, that pisses me off because normal people, who write articles about things that do concern me (day-to-day programming solutions/concepts) are switching over in droves to "blogging" their articles and ideas. So when I google about a particular c# or java problem I am having, and out of the top 10 results on the page 7 of them are posted to some damn blog site or in blog format, my #*$&#*$& corporate firewall won't let me get to the article.
What is wrong with a good old fashion article on a web page explaining how to get some new programming concept hammered out????
I'm out (from the Almost-a-blog-department)
Don't anthropomorphize computers: they hate that.
TV is a vast wasteland of crap, with a few great exceptions like Galactica and Six Feet Under.
The blogosphere is full of nonsense, self-referential mental masturbation, and useless blogrolls. Then there are blogs like Daring Fireball, The Long Tail, and WWDNK which are each compelling in their own way.
Spam, though, is 100% crap. In that 10% lies the difference.
Read the EFF's Fair Use FAQ
Now for the tech diss. The blogger has no idea what he is doing. Tell me stupid blogger, what is a C struk? What is a PERL registered expression? WHO is Linux Torvalds? You do not know. Sadly. All you know is your cats, and maybe what you had for lunch, and how to link to your frends. Well, try getting a girl with THAT. Ha ha I laugh at you.
Now sad bloggger. If you'll excuse me, I have to go back to better activities than thinking about you, such as reading Slashdot and making some karma that is actually WORTH something, not stupid PageRank for my BLOG. If you see me on the street (I am the one in the pimp ALL YOUR BASE tshirt) go the other way. Do not look. Do not linhger. Go home and write about your FEELings and live the mack programming to the /. crowd and see who wins the girls.
Dys
In other shocking news, millions of people keep diaries!
HOLY COW who knew?
Can we please get some "stuff that matters" now?
is competition good, or is duplication of effort bad?
You make it sound as if most bloggers are wasting their own and everyone else's time. Sure, that's probably true, but what the hell, man? Don't you make your living off people you don't know providing free content for your blog here? If Bill Gates said something like, "Most OSS programs are created by someone you don't know, and often do something you don't care about, but that hasn't stopped 'coding' from becoming a remarkably ubiquitous phenomenon. There are even programs about coding such as CVS. It looks like everyone wants their fifteen minutes of programming fame," it'd probably make you a little aggrivated, no? Have mercy on the 'upstarts,' o high and mighty Taco.
I hate euphemisms.
Let's stop calling these things blogs (a word which was probably invented by a corporate whore with too much time on his hands), and start calling them what they have always been called. It's a f*cking journal that's readable by the public.
// file: mice.h
#include "frickin_lasers.h"
I think, actually, one of the reasons people mod "overrated" and "underrated" is because it's a way to mod numerically without having to choose a description that doesn't fit. The mod probably thought that it was a generally bad post, though not flamebait or trolling.
Also, why can't a post at it's unmoderated default rating be overrated or underrated?
Procrastination -- because good things come to those who wait.
Wow, I remember when I was a teen and the internet was the new big thing (granted, this was the early 90's and the internet wasn't new then, but...)
Everyone was saying how great it would be when everyone was able to easily create and share information.
People, this is what we wanted, and it's pretty much here. This is a good thing. All we need now are better and better ways of sorting & indexing the information being created and shared.
The NY Times, Philadelphia Inquirer and San Jose Mercury News all announced staff layoffs last week. Where do you think those folks are going? To the Web, to eat their former employers' collective lunches. Lots of these folks have real expertise, and are bringing their contacts and rolodexes with them.
I speak from experience. I took the plunge in 2000. I was the computer-assisted reporting director at a daily newspaper that was clueless about the future of the web, and unwilling to invest in the basics (e-mail for repoters ... doh!). So I left to write for technology sites, and have been doing it ever since.
RichM
Data Center Knowledge