Blogs

 

What is a blog?

 

The"Weblog"

• a regularly updated website with new posts appearing at the begining. 

   

• Blogs evolved from early online journals with the advent of hosted blogging website

• Xanga (1996)

 

• Open Diary (1998)

 

• Live Journal (1999)

 

• Blogger (1999)

 

Community

• Tools such as trackbacks, permalinks and blogrolls helped create a sense of community among bloggers

 

Media Respectability

• Blogs entered the mainstream media scene in the early 2000s as news blogs began to cover the conflict in Iraq

 

• During the 2004 presidential election campaign, bloggers came to the forefront, as individuals blogged live from the national conventions, pundits used blogs to challenge mainstream media, and candidates Howard Dean and Wesley Clark used their blogs to reach out to "digital natives"

 

• Now, many traditional news services (newspapers, news networks, and radio) employ blogs as a way to reach out to new customers.

 

Blogs at large

• According to the Pew Internet & American Life Project:

 

• 8 million American adults say they have created blogs

   

• 27% of internet users read blogs -- an increase of 58% since 2004

   

• 5% of internet users say they use RSS aggregators or XML readers to get postings from blogs

   

• 12% of internet users have posted comments or other material on blogs"

 

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Characteristics of a blog

 

• Traditional Blogs

   

  • a blog is basically a website which is updated regularly with new entries-- think of it as an online journal/diary or newsletter

     

   

  • blogs are generally made up of posts (entries); these new entries appear at the top of the webpage allowing the reader to see new information as it appears on the blog

     

  • blogs will also have an archive, allowing you to read older blog entries

     

  • blogs often feature blogrolls (a list of recommended blogs for further reading), permalinks (a stable URL allowing you to link directly to an individual post) and trackbacks (a way the blogger learns when a post has been linked to)

     

  • blogs frequently contain links to outside webpages or to other blogs and may contain images, video, or audio

   

   

• Micro-blogs

   

  • micro-blogs are smaller, generally simpler blogs, used for posting quick, 1-2 line posts or "updates"

   

  • micro-blogs are usually added to via e-mail, text-messaging or instant messaging

     

    • Twitter

    • Jaiku

       

• Tumblelogs

   

  • tumble blogs are stream-lined blogs, usually favoring multi-media, quotes, links and dialogue over the longer commentarry-style of traditional blogs

     

    • Tumblr

 

Video:  Blogs in Plain English

Click To Play

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What are blogs good for?

 

• Journals or diaries

   

• Sharing information on an upcoming event or topic (wedding blogs)

   

• Continuing commentary on a subject (information, as you find it, on a topic)

   

• Keeping track of your thoughts on a subject

   

• Sharing links and other online finds

 

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Examples of blogs

 

Blog Directories

Google Blog Search:  http://blogsearch.google.com/

Technorati:  http://technorati.com/pop/blogs/ (today's most popular blogs)

 

Academic

COD Library Blog

 

News

Guardian Unlimited Newsblog

 

Technology

Slashdot.org  

 

Fun/Misc.

Boingboing.net

 

Personal

Awesome! A Blog 

 

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Activity

 

Create your own tumblelog

1. Go to Tumblr at http://www.tumblr.com

2. Click Sign Up

3. Enter your email address

4. Create a password that you will remember

5. Give your new blog a name

6. Click Sign Up and Start Posting

7. Choose a type of post from your dashboard 

     8. When you're done, click "Share Post".  That's it!  You're a blogger!

 

Advanced steps

• Click on Account-- from here you can customize your blog and share it with others

• Extras-- Add a bookmarklet to your browser's bookmark bar to make sharing items on Tumblr even easier

• Theme-- Give your blog a title and a brief description.  Change the way your blog looks one of Tumblr's themes and then customize it further with colors of your own choosing.

• Settings-- Change the URL of your blog whenever you wish and add a photo.  Update your password and email information here, too.  Advanced options will help you get your blog noticed.

• Feeds-- import the content of other blogs into your own (see the section on RSS Feeds for more information on this topic)

   

 

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