Weblogging, klogging, blogging

What is a weblog?

A weblog is basically a web site that is edited by one person, which contains short posts that usually reference to material elsewhere on the Web. Well, sort of.

Weblogs can also be link sites where short posts with a weblink and a comment on the link are displayed, and can come from a large number of people (like slashdot). Or, they can be an online journal.

What these two have in common is what I use to define a weblog, that is, short posts arranged in chronological order. Some other features might include archival, so that older posts can still be viewed once they are deemed unworthy for the front page; articles, or longer, more permanent posts that are kept on the same server as the weblog, also written by the closed user group or single editor. Some examples include a links page, a commentaray on an important issue, or poem that the editor wanted people to be able to read.

What all this means

I think that weblogging is an important step in online communication. We have email, which can show one, or more, people what we wanted to say. For this, we send them information. And then there is instant messaging, where we can send one person some information instantly. And there is the web, an inpersonal network of knowledge that we can reference when informing other people.

Weblogging manages to combine these three aspects of the Internet. Imagine being able to send an email to everyone, instantly, and being able to show the information in a web format.  This is pretty much a weblog, with one difference: the content is shown to the audience by their request. You can inform people that there is something to be accessed on your weblog via email or IM, but it is their choice to access it.

Further reading