Blogs: the Human side of Internet
Wow! It’s been about a year since I've heard the word blog, ironically in a blog site. Back then, it seemed totally absurd idea of sharing your intimate information publicly with the world. However, after moving away from dialup it seems the roads to information super highway is opening up although the speeds are still really low compared to other countries but the question is what makes these blogs so special? This sudden upsurge of neo-bloggers giving news, even anonymously leaking information shows what the internet is really capable of.
A well known cliché of our times is "By the People, for the people and from the people", taken from the famous Gettysburg speech by Ab Lincoln during the Civil War, seems to be coming true at least in blogs. Take for example the recent revolution in Nepal. Although the government had banned a lot of sites (especially the blogs), people were still discussing the conditions in Nepal very similar to the Bulletin Boards during the 90’s when Soviet Union was breaking down. It just takes an article to make a local issue global. You need not be in the same room to discuss with someone an issue common to everyone. I see these blogs as elements of the road to democratization of a society.
Philosophies apart, what makes a blog, A BLOG?
People are inquisitive by nature, competitive even; they like to be known and noticed even behind the vein of an adopted alias. These are the same people who talk about privacy and yet envy the “celebrities” being followed by paparazzi. A blog is an expression of things people want to say, maybe even ramblings and all. There are some, like me, who want to hone their writing skills. There is a sense of freedom in the electronic medium not provided by anything else… apart from the good typeset and all, you can “UNDO” stuffs; there are spell checkers for the particularly dyslexic and for some small errors... It’s cool to type …
Another pulling factor is ads, particularly “Google adsense”. If you are money minded or just having a desire to make some pocket money for a change, you might be here, if the obvious inquisitive demand isn’t convincing enough to spend more time writing about your life… It’s been two weeks since I started to blog and a week since I have actually begun posting regularly; it’s been fruitful so far. It started from a desire to understand myself better for my upcoming college applications to become a more ambitious money making venture imagining huge dividends… It is possible, if you are willing to work for it, to earn money from a blog.
There could be any number of reasons for such a venture… now what? Let’s look at what shaped this revolution?
Cheap storage: Back when Google gave 1000 MBs on April 1st, it was considered by many as just a joke, a culture at google… goofing up something funny on April 1st, my favorite being the research facility on moon… The main reason for enabling google to beat all its competition was the cheapening of hard drives and computers apart from its characteristic innovative strategies.
Prior experiences: Blogs are nothing new…. They are mere newer manifestations of older and even obsolete things like bulletin boards and Usenet but in a new world… Blogs are often associated with “Web 2.0”, a term invented by O’reilly, more of a gimmick in my view as it just includes a specific web site category more than the methodologies for them.. still it was necessary for the current upsurge in the blogosphere...
Competitions: There are so many companies fighting for a chunk of your life. These billion dollar companies are fighting hard to get your blogs posted to their sites... A chunk of your life.. aahh....
One thing is for sure now.. in the future your whole life would be googleable... maybe you'd be googled for vacancy..
Pleez comment on this... still very much under construction and digg it!!! pleezz
A well known cliché of our times is "By the People, for the people and from the people", taken from the famous Gettysburg speech by Ab Lincoln during the Civil War, seems to be coming true at least in blogs. Take for example the recent revolution in Nepal. Although the government had banned a lot of sites (especially the blogs), people were still discussing the conditions in Nepal very similar to the Bulletin Boards during the 90’s when Soviet Union was breaking down. It just takes an article to make a local issue global. You need not be in the same room to discuss with someone an issue common to everyone. I see these blogs as elements of the road to democratization of a society.
Philosophies apart, what makes a blog, A BLOG?
People are inquisitive by nature, competitive even; they like to be known and noticed even behind the vein of an adopted alias. These are the same people who talk about privacy and yet envy the “celebrities” being followed by paparazzi. A blog is an expression of things people want to say, maybe even ramblings and all. There are some, like me, who want to hone their writing skills. There is a sense of freedom in the electronic medium not provided by anything else… apart from the good typeset and all, you can “UNDO” stuffs; there are spell checkers for the particularly dyslexic and for some small errors... It’s cool to type …
Another pulling factor is ads, particularly “Google adsense”. If you are money minded or just having a desire to make some pocket money for a change, you might be here, if the obvious inquisitive demand isn’t convincing enough to spend more time writing about your life… It’s been two weeks since I started to blog and a week since I have actually begun posting regularly; it’s been fruitful so far. It started from a desire to understand myself better for my upcoming college applications to become a more ambitious money making venture imagining huge dividends… It is possible, if you are willing to work for it, to earn money from a blog.
There could be any number of reasons for such a venture… now what? Let’s look at what shaped this revolution?
Cheap storage: Back when Google gave 1000 MBs on April 1st, it was considered by many as just a joke, a culture at google… goofing up something funny on April 1st, my favorite being the research facility on moon… The main reason for enabling google to beat all its competition was the cheapening of hard drives and computers apart from its characteristic innovative strategies.
Prior experiences: Blogs are nothing new…. They are mere newer manifestations of older and even obsolete things like bulletin boards and Usenet but in a new world… Blogs are often associated with “Web 2.0”, a term invented by O’reilly, more of a gimmick in my view as it just includes a specific web site category more than the methodologies for them.. still it was necessary for the current upsurge in the blogosphere...
Competitions: There are so many companies fighting for a chunk of your life. These billion dollar companies are fighting hard to get your blogs posted to their sites... A chunk of your life.. aahh....
One thing is for sure now.. in the future your whole life would be googleable... maybe you'd be googled for vacancy..
Pleez comment on this... still very much under construction and digg it!!! pleezz
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