GROWING PAINS

'To blog or not to blog' is a question journalists, both professional or otherwise, ask themselves at some point. We have all heard the debate on whether blogging can be classified as a legitimate form of writing or merely self expression, and if 'the blog' has a future. Like all forms of communication evolution is both inevitable and necessary. Blogs are no different, and their success or otherwise lies in the evolution of the platform.
A lot of things are superseded and become essentially obsolete. Blogs face the challenge of growing within an industry that consistently revolves around new ideas, fads and the ever-present demands of immediacy. Consider the following for instance. First we were impressed be emails simple, and 'amazing', capabilities to bring people together from all parts of the world. Soon we would be able to add pictures and attachments. Then instant messaging or 'IM' came along and the process was even more immediate and in 'real time'. Forums created online communities to create assimilation and now blogging ultimately does all of the above and faces the challenge of becomming bigger and more important without losing the 'necessary' or 'wow factor' from the online community. The 'Tech Beat blog' on Business Week (http://www.businessweek.com/the_thread/techbeat/archives/2005/02/the_future_of_b.html) feels that 'tagging', a concept widely used for labelling people in pictures in programs such as Facebook, will provide blogs with a 'wider net' on which to base their substantiality or importance. It argues that people will be able to search for issues or keywords rather than just relying on a membership or feed to a particular blog. Thereby the 'net' will be cast onto more blogs or similar articles etc that contain the area of interest. The blog's final comment sums up the argument rather well:
"Today, you might send an interesting article with a personal comment to your 40 best friends via e-mail. Tomorrow, you might comment on it on your blog, and your comment would reach 4 million people, including all your friends. Not bad, huh?"