Blog :: What is a Blog?

Blog - What is a blog?.

Blog, web log, weblog is a journal, diary or notebook.

A Blog is written regularly on a daily or weekly basis to a website.

You can blog about life, business, interests or whatever you want to write about.

A blog is a social update to your readers about regular newsworthy events that you wish to share. The word blog is a derivative of 'web log' or 'weblog'. A blog is a shared on-line journal or notebook. It is updated frequently, usually daily. A web log is located on a website.

Blogging is a very powerful way of harnessing the immediacy of the internet to disseminate topical information quickly and to a broad audience. Once a blog is established it's coverage can be enormous.

A blog can be utilised by one or more authors. Each author can:

• Post - enter a blog onto a host blogger site. This could be called a "blog post".
• Read - as a blog is posted chronologically, one reads a blog in a "last in first out" manner, meaning that the last item posted is at the top of the blog. Basically with a blog you read entries from the end to the beginning, otherwise it would be classified as a magazine.
• Write - this is creating the blog experience for your readers. It is not just about creating coherent copy that people will read and want to come back for another fix. Writing a blog includes the blog page layout; the pictures and graphics you use to enhance the user experience; and it also means placing videos and web-links and additional information about yourself as a publisher. And don't forget that writing a blog does not finish when you post it. There will, hopefully, be comments to manage.
• Edit - once you have posted the blog and received your first comments and commented back, it is time to reflect whether you have done everything to maximise the potential of the blog. SEO (Search Engine Optimization) and writing are never perfect the first time. Now is the time to adjust those sentences and other content for maximum return.

and / or

• Reflect - on a job well done. Now it is time to promote your blog.

on regular diary entries, texts or articles of commentary and opinions.

And talking of promoting your blog, this is mine on Blogs and Google:

Google and Blogs a blog by Humagaia

A blog can be about just about anything. The most noteworthy aspects of life that a blog comments on are:

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• Personal experiences - this is a diary of events that happen in a life. It contains actual experiences and emotions (or made up if you like). It can include aspects of all other blog types
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• Knowledge - a knowledge blog aims to publish scientific, academic and technical knowledge as it becomes available.
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• Events - an events blog will usually not be general but will establish a readership that is interested in that one event or the series of events that make up the event calendar. You might write about the 2012 Olympic Games and the build up to it or you might blog about the World Series in Baseball.
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• News - blogging lends itself very well to the news channel. A news blog is immediate much more so than waiting for a newspaper to be published or the scheduled time-slot for a news bulletin to arrive. Immediacy is the name of the game here.
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• Graphics - if you are into graphic art or just plain graphics, a blog can be utilised to get your work out there in front of potential buyers and those that would appreciate the artistry.
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• Pictures - again there will be some restrictions on a blogger site as to where your pictures can be placed as the site has usually optimized it's ad placement slots for maximum return. If you run your own blog site, then the restrictions are ones you have imposed on yourself.
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• Photos - if you create your own or appreciate others photographs then a photos blog is the method of getting the product to the audience.
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• Videos - as for photographs.
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• Websites - another type of blog is one where the blogger summarises, reviews or just recommends web-sites that they have found and enjoyed. There is plenty of content out there and there are blogs that fall into every specialist category imaginable.

An author of a blog reserves the right to post works they consider pertinent. Blog entries can be discussed and readers have the opportunity to post comments against each journal entry.

A blog looks much the same as any other web presence, except there is an interactive element involved. Blog entries are displayed in reverse-chronological order, meaning the first entry is the latest entry. All blog entries posted can be found by scrolling down the page to links pointing to older blog entries. The whole blog (the entire output of a blogger, hosted on a blogger site) is available for viewing and one is able to see the older blog posts queued behind.

A blog equates to a time-line of the life of an individual, a business or groups of like-minded bloggers, especially where a particular topic is common to the group. If you imagine that one entity creates all the subject contents for a diary and publishes one article at a time (the equivalent of a page perhaps) from the beginning, then your mental observation will not be far from reality. Once the latest page is read, you can trawl back through the diary to see what happened previously. Once you have reached the beginning of a saga, you can then read forwards once again.

A blog is a veritable "Captain's Log" of events and thoughts: a journal of important events on the voyage of life.

And if you got this far then you must be interested in knowing that there are many resources just as good as this one (if not better) waiting for you to find out about on my blog "Google and Blogs" by Humagaia.

Star date 2010. All rights reserved.

"Beam me up Scotty!".

Below you will find a slide-show of the set up I created for my blog, to show the elements that can be incorporated into a blogger blog.

Addenda:

1. The term blog is sometimes used, incorrectly, to describe unaffiliated discussion forums and websites.
2. A blog is located on a maintained website.

If you have enjoyed reading this article, please take a moment to give some feedback. It does not have to be written down, although I have left some pencils for you to use. [Please do not remove them, the next person may need to use it]. It could be just a thumbs up (hopefully not down) and an indication as to the emotion it evoked. And if you have the time please consider returning to the top of this hub to post of Facebook and Twitter, thank you.

Here you will find dictionary definitions for terms used in this article:

Definition::

• Blog - derivative of 'web log' or 'weblog'. A shared on-line journal or notebook, updated frequently (usually daily), located on a website, where one or more authors can post, read, write, edit and reflect on regular diary entries, texts or articles of commentary and opinions about personal experiences, knowledge, events, news, graphics, photos, videos and other material like what is on other websites. Authors reserve the right to post works they consider pertinent. These can be discussed and readers have the opportunity to post comments against each journal entry. The entries are displayed in reverse-chronological order, meaning the first entry is the latest entry; a time-line of a life or business. A veritable "Captain's log" of events and thoughts. Sometimes used (incorrectly) to describe unaffiliated discussion forums and websites. There are many different kinds of blog.
• Blogs - plural of blog - : see blog. Blogs are an increasingly popular source of online publication about political information, opinions and alternative news coverage. Blogs can gain a strong readership.
• Web log - the long version of blog: aka: weblog - see blog.
• Weblog - the concatination of 'web log' - see blog.
  
  
• Blogger - a contributor who keeps and updates an online journal (blog).
• Blogger Service - is a storage service, originally from Pyra Labs, and subsequently bought by Google in 2003, that hosts private or multi-user blogs. The blog entries hosted are time-stamped.
• Blogging - the design and editing of a blog; aka weblogging.

The following HubPages articles are ones that I can recommend as further reading if this article has not fully answered the question: "Whats a Blog?": These cover more broad topics regarding blog, blogs and blogging:

• Blog Submission Sites: Add Your Site For Free Dofollow Backlinks & Traffic! by Ryankett
• 25 Ways to Get Links to your Blog by Kathryn Vercillo
• 25 Ways to Drive Traffic to your Blog by Kathryn VercilloArticles about blogging articles:

Articles about blogging articles:

• Blog Article

• Write Articles, Not Blog Postings by Jacob Nielsen

The following references regarding blog, blogs, web log, weblogs and blogging are notable:

• NZMuseum Glossary of Terms: "Blog - An on-line commentary of news or events that is written and maintained by NSTP. Blogs operate much like an on-line daily or weekly journal, with the latest blog entry appearing first." http://www.nzmuseums.co.nz/glossary
• OJR: Online Journalism Review: "Blog: Derivative of "weblog." A series of entries to an online journal, posted in some chronological order. Sometimes used, incorrectly, by writers to describe discussion forums or even all websites not affiliated with offline publishers. A blog can be written by an individual or a group. It can allow comments to entries or not."
• EnglishClub.com: "Blog is a short form of “web log”. Log means a diary or journal, usually a notebook where you write regular reports of what you did or thought. Every ship has a “captain’s log” in which the captain records details of the ship’s voyage day by day. “Web log” means a log that you keep on the (world wide) web." eslblogs.englishclub.com/blog/help/vocabulary/
• foodinfo I quest: "blog: typically a hybrid of a personal diary and a commentary / guide to what is on other websites, although there are actually many different types of blogs."
  www.foodinfoquest.com/glossary
• Princeton wordnetweb: "blog (a shared on-line journal where people can post diary entries about their personal experiences and hobbies)." wordnetweb.princeton.edu/perl/webwn
• Wikipedia: "Blogger is a blog storage service that allows private or multi-user blogs with time-stamped entries. It was created by Pyra Labs, which was bought by Google in 2003. Generally, the blogs are hosted by Google at subdomains of blogspot.com. Up until May 1, 2010 Blogger allowed users to publish blogs on other hosts, via ftp. All such blogs had (or still have) to be moved to Google's own servers, with domains other than blogspot.com allowed via Custom URLs". en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blogger_(service)
• Masterbase: "Blog: a regularly updated website wherein texts or articles of one or more authors are shown in a reverse-chronological order, meaning the first one is the latest one. Authors conserve the right to post works they consider pertinent." www.en.masterbase.com/support/glossary.asp
• Philip Greenspun: Blog: "An online journal, published frequently (often daily). Readers can post comments on each journal entry. Some blogs gain a wide readership, such as this one: http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/philg/. The term blog is a shortening of weblog." philip.greenspun.com/seia/glossary
• Wiktionary: Blog: "website that allows users to reflect, share opinions, and discuss various topics in the form of an online journal while readers may comment on posts. Entries typically appear in reverse chronological order" en.wiktionary.org/wiki/blog
• Wikipedia: "A blog (a blend of the term "web log") is a type of website or part of a website. Blogs are usually maintained by an individual with regular entries of commentary, descriptions of events, or other material such as graphics or video. Entries are commonly displayed in reverse-chronological order. "Blog" can also be used as a verb, meaning "to maintain or add content to a blog"." en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blog

Blogs with wide following:

• Philip Greenspun's Weblog

  http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/philg/.
• BoingBoing
• Shoemoney
• Talkingpointsmemo.com
• PerezHilton.com
• Gothamist
• Techcrunch
• Mashable
• Problogger