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Twitter, Flickr, Facebook Make Blogs Look So 2004

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Saved by 71 people (-13 private), first by anonymouse user on 2008-10-21


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Thinking about launching your own blog? Here's some friendly advice: Don't. And if you've already got one, pull the plug.

Highlighted by rakerman

Twitter, Flickr, Facebook Make Blogs Look So 2004

Highlighted by xmoisant

Writing a weblog today isn't the bright idea it was four years ago.

Highlighted by sswynn

Writing a weblog today isn't the bright idea it was four years ago. The blogosphere, once a freshwater oasis of folksy self-expression and clever thought, has been flooded by a tsunami of paid bilge. Cut-rate journalists and underground marketing campaigns now drown out the authentic voices of amateur wordsmiths. It's almost impossible to get noticed, except by hecklers. And why bother? The time it takes to craft sharp, witty blog prose is better spent expressing yourself on Flickr, Facebook, or Twitter.

Highlighted by acidcookie

If you quit now, you're in good company.

Highlighted by xmoisant

Jason Calacanis made millions from his Weblogs network. But he flat-out retired his own blog in July. "Blogging is simply too big, too impersonal, and lacks the intimacy that drew me to it," he wrote in his final post.

Impersonal is correct: Scroll down Technorati's list of the top 100 blogs and you'll find personal sites have been shoved aside by professional ones. Most are essentially online magazines: The Huffington Post. Engadget. TreeHugger. A stand-alone commentator can't keep up with a team of pro writers cranking out up to 30 posts a day.

Highlighted by wineandlaxfan

"Blogging is simply too big, too impersonal, and lacks the intimacy that drew me to it,"

Highlighted by chr15t14n

"Blogging is simply too big, too impersonal, and lacks the intimacy that drew me to it,"

Highlighted by acidcookie

Scroll down Technorati's list of the top 100 blogs and you'll find personal sites have been shoved aside by professional ones.

Highlighted by xmoisant

Scroll down Technorati's list of the top 100 blogs and you'll find personal sites have been shoved aside by professional ones.

Highlighted by sswynn

ssional ones. Most are essentially online magazines:

Highlighted by sswynn

Scroll down Technorati's list of the top 100 blogs and you'll find personal sites have been shoved aside by professional ones

Highlighted by acidcookie

When blogging was young, enthusiasts rode high, with posts quickly skyrocketing to the top of Google's search results for any given topic, fueled by generous links from fellow bloggers. In 2002, a search for "Mark" ranked Web developer Mark Pilgrim above author Mark Twain. That phenomenon was part of what made blogging so exciting. No more. Today, a search for, say, Barack Obama's latest speech will deliver a Wikipedia page, a Fox News article, and a few entries from professionally run sites like Politico.com. The odds of your clever entry appearing high on the list? Basically zero.

Highlighted by sswynn

Further, text-based Web sites aren't where the buzz is anymore. The reason blogs took off is that they made publishing easy for non-techies. Part of that simplicity was a lack of support for pictures, audio, and videoclips.

Highlighted by xmoisant

Further, text-based Web sites aren't where the buzz is anymore. The reason blogs took off is that they made publishing easy for non-techies.

Highlighted by sswynn

Social multimedia sites like YouTube, Flickr, and Facebook have since made publishing pics and video as easy as typing text.

Highlighted by xmoisant

Take a clue from Robert Scoble, who made his name as Microsoft's "technical evangelist" blogger from 2003 to 2006. Today, he focuses on posting videos and Twitter updates. "I keep my blog mostly for long-form writing," he says.

Highlighted by acidcookie

Twitter — which limits each text-only post to 140 characters — is to 2008 what the blogosphere was to 2004.

Highlighted by xmoisant

Twitter — which limits each text-only post to 140 characters — is to 2008 what the blogosphere was to 2004.

Highlighted by sswynn

And Twitter posts can be searched instantly, without waiting for Google to index them.

Highlighted by wineandlaxfan

Twitter — which limits each text-only post to 140 characters — is to 2008 what the blogosphere was to 2004. You'll find Scoble, Calacanis, and most of their buddies from the golden age there. They claim it's because Twitter operates even faster than the blogosphere.

Highlighted by acidcookie

And Twitter posts can be searched instantly, without waiting for Google to index them.

Highlighted by sswynn

Twitter's character limit puts everyone back on equal footing.

Highlighted by mboykis

As a writer, though, I'm onto the system's real appeal: brevity. Bloggers today are expected to write clever, insightful, witty prose to compete with Huffington and The New York Times. Twitter's character limit puts everyone back on equal footing. It lets amateurs quit agonizing over their writing and cut to the chase.

Highlighted by acidcookie

@WiredReader: Kill yr blog. 2004 over. Google won't find you. Too much cruft from HuffPo, NYT. Commenters are tards. C u on Facebook?

Highlighted by vitale