…I am asked every day as a trainer for internet & web design. Well, you will find anything you always wanted to know about Blogs & Bloggers, but didn´t dare to ask, in this blog…
The term Blog is derived from Web+Log and defines a kind of diary on the web, actually a logbook, where people publish thoughts, dreams, plans, philosophies, weird, romance – more or less usefull information on the web. Jorn Barger first used the term weblog on December 17, 1997. If I visit his – horrid – homepage, I feel relegated to those ancient, grey days of the web, where I earned my first diopter honestly… Peter Merholz coined the term blog on his website in 1999.
That´s nothing new at all,
I hear you complaining. Correct. Logorrhoic weblings are nothing new. Unfortunately those suadas often spread over light-blue checkered page backgrounds with yellow fonts and blinking pink butterflies (or aliens) following your cursor… I still feel nausea just thinking back to those days of “private pages”. It did not help at all, that some of those authors (aka diarists, journalers, escribitionists, journalists) delivered really good stuff.
Now, what the hell is so new with those blogs?
To keep it short: a) the technique, b) the circulation, c) the numbers and…
The above mentioned precursors of today´s blogmania often tinkered their “journals”, news magazines and similar formats “by hand”, they created and updated HTML pages. Many of those journals just being a small part of a larger web platform.
What makes blogging to a veritable mass phenomenon is the simple technique. Actually, to blog means, you don´t have to hassle with technique at all anymore. Simple editorial systems allow to publish articles via browser, email, cell phone and phone…
d) Fine Design…
One of the most important advantages of blogs for me as web designer? The above mentioned grisly “private pages” almost completely disappeared! Even the most unexperienced blogger may choose from zillions of sophisticated designs and thus does not even consider to create an own one… Yippieh!