Top Seven Tips to Writing an Effective Blog

If ever there were a perfect tool for the corporate communication expert, blogging is it. Think of a blog as the 3D version of your capabilities, one in which you provide context and meaning to your work experience and expertise. So let's talk about how to blog well.

Weil, Debbie. Communication World Bulletin (2005). Articles>Web Design>Writing>Blogging

Weblogs and the Mass Amateurization of Publishing

A lot of people in the weblog world are asking 'How can we make money doing this?' The answer is that most of us can't. Weblogs are not a new kind of publishing that requires a new system of financial reward. Instead, weblogs mark a radical break.

Shirky, Clay. Shirky.com (2002). Articles>Web Design>Writing>Blogging

Weblogs Revisited: The Phenomenon of Public Digital Journals

Notwithstanding the fact that lexicographers have come up with definitions for blog, if you asked a few dozen bloggers what makes a blog a blog, you would probably get a few dozen answers.

Kissell, Joe. Interesting Thing of the Day (2004). Articles>Web Design>Writing>Blogging

Weblogs, Rhetoric, Community, and Culture

Looking at blogs as rhetorical artifacts allows scholars to examine the ways in which they contribute to changing what it means to communicate online. To this end, the articles presented here view the blog through the lens of their social, cultural, and rhetorical features and functions. Through study of the language, discourse, and communicative practices of bloggers, the authors provide insight into weblogs as a means of representing and expressing the self, forming identity, facilitating student-centered learning, building community, and disseminating information.

Gurak, Laura J., Smiljana Antonijevic, Laurie Johnson, Clancy Ratliff and Jessica Reyman. Into the Blogosphere (2004). Articles>Web Design>Writing>Blogging

What Makes a Weblog a Weblog?

Assuming a Wiki is a weblog-like system that allows anyone to edit anything (I know some don't) then a Wiki represents an interesting amalgam of many voices, not the unedited voice of a single person.

Winer, Dave. Harvard University (2003). Articles>Web Design>Writing>Blogging

What We're Doing When We Blog

Every day it seems another article about weblogs appears in the press. At first, most of these stories seemed content to cover the personal nature of blogging. But more and more I'm seeing articles that attempt to examine the journalistic and punditry aspects of weblogs prominent in many of the so-called 'warblogs,' or sites that began in response to the events of September 11th

Hourihan, Meg. O'Reilly and Associates (2002). Articles>Web Design>Writing>Blogging

What's Really Going On With the Blogosphere?  

Explores the notion of the blogosphere by using recent studies to soberly refocus the actual size of the blogosphere and the extent of the blogging phenomenon.

Vieta, Marcelo. Digest (2003). Articles>Web Design>Writing>Blogging

Why I Hate Weblogs!

There are, I'm sure, as many reasons to keep weblogs as there are weblogs authors, however, some common threads surely exist between them. What could motivate someone to keep a public journal of their innermost thoughts? What possible reasons would someone have?

Indiana State University (2002). Articles>Web Design>Writing>Blogging

Women and Children Last: The Discursive Construction of Weblogs

As yet there has been little empirical examination of the claim that blogs are 'democratic,' or that blog authors represent diverse demographic groups.

Herring, Susan C., Inna Kouper, Lois Ann Scheidt and Elijah L. Wright. Into the Blogosphere (2004). Articles>Web Design>Writing>Blogging

The Year of the Blog: Weblogs in the Writing Classroom

While blogs (short for 'weblogs') have been around since at least 1993, something in the stars and planets has just now come into alignment, making blogs rise above the horizon of notice.

Computers and Composition (2004). Articles>Web Design>Writing>Blogging