INTRODUCTION

Blogging, and the blogosphere, are experiencing phenomenal growth. According to Technorati[1], the often-described “Google of the blogosphere,” there are 7.7 million active blogs, and the size of the blogosphere doubles every five-and-a-half months!

Not only are people writing blogs, there’s no shortage of readers. An August 2005 comScore Networks’ report[2] stated 50 million U.S. Internet users visited blog sites in the first quarter of 2005--roughly 30 percent of U.S. Internet users. These readers aren’t just hipsters and political activists. According to comScore, blog readers are heavy Internet users, with high incomes, and a greater propensity (30 percent) to buy online. A great demographic to be a part of, and tap into!

From the above numbers, it is obvious the blogosphere has traction. It also has influence, as seen in the 2004 election and the downfall of Dan Rather. In addition, the blogosphere has tremendous (in the moment) reach, as demonstrated in the aftermaths of both the Tsunami[3], and the London bombings.

While the blogosphere is young, with both growth and contraction ahead of it, it shouldn’t be discounted as a fad. Sure, the technology and participants will change, but the underlying catalyst will remain. Individuals want to collaborate, share ideas, discuss common interests and enemies, and in general, interact.

At the Patricia Seybold Group, our interest in the blogosphere is three-fold. First, as researchers, writers, and publishers, the blogosphere provides us with new sources of information, new delivery mechanisms, and (of course) new competitive and copyright challenges. Second, as technologists, we are interested in the simple, yet effective technology of the blogosphere. We can’t help but contemplate the implications and opportunities for enterprise IT. Third, as business strategists, we are intrigued by the business implications of blogging--on marketing, brand, customer relationships, and (Patty’s passion), customer innovation.

Obviously, it’s early. There are still more questions than answers on the blogosphere’s impact. However, it’s not too early to get familiar with the blogosphere, and as we are doing, wade in a little[4]. At a minimum, we advise our clients to find and listen to the blogosphere conversations about their companies, and their competitors.

In this primer, we help you get familiar with the mechanics of the blogosphere. We explain the blog and blogosphere basics, including blog structure, authoring, syndication, searching, reading, and tagging. In future writings, reports, and blog posts, we’ll explore some of the impacts of the blogosphere.

BLOG BASICS

What Is a Weblog or Blog?

From a pure definition standpoint, a weblog (blog)[5] is an online journal, or diary. Blogs are typically authored by an individual, and contain periodic entries, on topics of interest to the writer. This seems trivial enough. However, the blogging practices and technology--linking, commenting, and syndication--enable any individual to be an online publisher, with the potential to reach and interact with millions of people.

Online publishing and reaching millions of people sounds complicated. And here we see the real power of blogging. Blogs and the blogosphere have an inherent simplicity. Blogs have a common, clean format. Blog tools (authoring, commenting, readers, subscription, tagging, and search) have intuitive interfaces. Blogs use standard technologies, such as HTML, hyperlinks, XML, RSS, and Atom. Blogs can be set up in a matter of minutes for free.

The hard part of blogging is in providing good, relevant, refreshed content, and cultivating a readership. But that’s where the effort should be––content and community––not mechanics. Let’s take a deeper look at the mechanics.

BLOG STRUCTURE

Generally, blogs follow simple one- to three-column layouts, with the majority of real estate allocated to the post area. Illustration 1 is a screen shot of a three-column blog with annotations for the common blog elements:

* Blog Name and Tagline. Choose wisely, as the name and tagline will appear on all syndications.

* Post Area. Posts appear chronically, with the most recent first. Post areas are typically limited to the most recent posts, or all posts for a time period (week, month).

* Post. Good posts are easily consumable, interesting, and provide links for user ease, writer ease (reuse), and above all, proper attribution. Posts are often text, but may contain images and multimedia elements. A general rule of thumb is posts should not be deleted or modified, unless the changes are explicitly noted, retaining the before and after views.

* Category/Tag. Every post should be placed into at least one well-known subject category. This organizes metadata for the site, and in some cases, also feeds blogosphere search engines, such as Technorati[6]. In Illustration 1, the first post is categorized in service-oriented architecture.

* Comments. Good interactive blog practices allow for readers to comment on posts. Best practices have the author responding--within the comment area, or offline--to all appropriate blog comments. Appropriateness is determined by the author, or blog moderator. Generally speaking, comments should only be blocked or deleted if they are spam or contain offensive language.

* Sidebar Links. Blog sidebars, the non-post areas, typically contain links to related resources, other bloggers (blogrolls), and even links to a link collection. This link to a link collection is shown in Illustration 1 with the “Link to my del.icio.us”. The del.icio.us service provides social tagging, which we will introduce later[7].

* Syndication Feed. The best way to build a reader base is to offer a syndication feed. The orange XML chiclet is the standard icon to denote syndication availability. A user can right click on the chiclet, copy the feed’s link location, and drop it in a reader. More information on syndication and readers is presented in subsequent sections.

* Post Navigation. Most blogs offer navigation to posts through a variety of means, such as calendar date, post title, category, and monthly archives.

* Blog Specific Content. Each blog should include information about itself, its purpose, author, accountability, and use. Illustration 1 shows a Creative Commons License[8], indicating some rights are reserved. Be certain to understand the license implications of the blog, and any comments.

BLOGGING

Blogging, the act of writing and posting, is quite simple. Most blog tools offer a WYSIWYG[9] interface, isolating the HTML from the blogger. Bloggers write their posts in the authoring tool, Microsoft Word, or even email, and then publish the posts to their sites. If the blog is syndicated, the authoring tool, and/or the blogger, pings feed aggregators to inform an update has occurred. Pings may be automated, using XML-RPC interfaces, or done manually, depending on your preference (pings slow down the posting process), and the capability of your authoring tool. For example ...