DISQUS

Hutch Carpenter · 1 year ago

Great post Mark. Regarding #5, staying engaged. I think the hardest part of that is the feeling of having to be "enlightening" in your every comment. That's a heavy burden. Sometimes, quick snippets are fine. The message with one little bit of perspective can go a long way toward staying engaged with readers. Robert Scoble is a good example of that. He's got it down to an art.

Mark Dykeman · 1 year ago

Hell, I feel a similar need to say something "significant" whenever I write online. Of course, I tend to undermine it occasionally by writing without using my filters (or brain), but still. Reputation management is a necessity, unfortunately.

Maria Reyes-McDavis · 1 year ago

Fabulous post, you've really put it in perspective.
Thanks for the tips!

Maria Reyes-McDavis
Marketing Masters Guide

Dilip Dand · 1 year ago

Mark, Great artilcle! This article really takes off from Robert Scoble's rant on how Tech bloggers have failed their audiences. If you read these two articles in sequence, they make a lot of sense. I like the section about looking out to non-tech folks for ideas. I really think the next set of leading bloggers will be people who can talk about utiliziing these cool technologies to solve interesting problems.

Mark Dykeman · 1 year ago

Thanks dvdand. I suppose that Robert Scoble's post did indirectly influence my post, but I was trying to find my way out of the echo chamber and suggest something else of importance.

ChangeForge | Ken Stewart · 1 year ago

Louis, very well stated... I am currently pursuing 2, 3, 4, 6 and 7... and I am a firm believer in 5, 8, and 9... I have found that in using this as a networking tool - it is most wonderful, and the opportunity to pay it forward is a big theme I buy into. Every chance I get to be nice to another blogosphere resident is another opportunity for me to influence the balance those in opposition seeking to undermine and destroy...

Thanks for sharing your thoughts.

ChangeForge | Ken Stewart · 1 year ago

Nuts... I suppose it would help if I would check the author - Greatest of apologies Mark. I did not intend to offend.

Mark Dykeman · 1 year ago

Heh, that's OK ChangeForge. It happens.

Walter Schwabe · 1 year ago

Great post Mark, lots to absorb and contemplate...for some up-to-the-minute meaningful, not-so-meaningful and down right meaningless tweets...twitter.com/fusedlogic

Sol Young · 1 year ago

I think what you're describing is the natural movement of the blogosphere to the mainstream...

The growth of blogging is automatic. We're moving towards each blog becoming a FriendFeed... An aggregation of one's activities and therefore a mashup of the services one subscribes to.

This page alone has MyBlogLog, FEEDJIT, FriendFeed commenting, Twitter status, and a list of your other subscribed services (that are probably working on blog widgets as we speak, if they don't have them already).

The cost of entry to the blogosphere is no longer the knowledge of administering a server and the ability to juggle UI with Perl, PHP, or Python. Today the cost to speak one's mind and share knowledge is the ownership of a computer or mobile phone and submitting a username and password.

We're seeing micro-blogging adopted by the non-blogging community (Twitter). We're seeing micro-video blogging pushed to the cellphone community (CNN iReporters). And now we're seeing a general trend towards connectivity and sharing in new location-based applications (Loopt, etc).

The blogosphere is going to grow automatically through new services that enable the mainstream to present valuable information and share their lives.

Mark Dykeman · 1 year ago

Sol, good points. However, as this whole area continues to grow, as you indicate, it will be more than a blogosphere. Nothing wrong with that.

Marco · 1 year ago

another great guest post - LG just might have a career ahead of him as a blogger talent scout!

Benedikt Köhler · 1 year ago

The potential of tomorrow lies in people who probably will not see themselves as bloggers at all. If the tools are easy enough (your first point), the "blogosophere" will be increasingly populated by ordinary people who just enjoy writing about what they are doing or what they are interested in.

Maybe tomorrow people who are blogging have no more in common than yesterday's people who are writing letters or who are using the telephone had?

Mark Dykeman · 1 year ago

Benedikt, please see my comment to Sol Young above. I think you're on to something.

Stupid Blogger · 1 year ago

Broadening the scope of the blogosphere *requires* "permeating more sectors of interest', as you put it. It's not just an option, it's the only way it will happen. The truth of the matter is that the current bloggy, social media community is for the most part one dimensional: we talk about stuff that 90% of the rest of the world doesn't care about.

Being a blogger doesn't mean you're a tech blogger, but I'm laying down odds that most are. Or worse, you're a blogger who blogs about blogging. Either way, the public at large doesn't care about such topics and don't want to follow the tweets or FriendFeed of such an author. The only way to reach them is to write about what they know, like, and understand.

Mark Dykeman · 1 year ago

Fair point about the concentration of tech bloggers

Julian Baldwin · 1 year ago

Katew · 1 year ago

To me, 2, 4, and 8 are key to getting more people interested in social media (outside of Facebook and, to some degree, Twitter). #4 is really the most important. Until those people who are not interested in trying every new social media site that comes along are shown concrete benefits, they won't bother trying new ones because it's too much work. Needs must be met and they must be met in a user friendly way. I hate to think of people in the mainstream as being slow or late to the game. I often just think they're like cats -- they're not going to move unless you give them a really good reason to do so. Until then, they're going to sit right there on that newspaper you left on the table last week, thank you very much.

awilensky · 1 year ago

Your list:

pontifications about A-Lists, aggregators, egoism, elitism, monetization, commercialization, capitalization,

Omits: capitation

The donut chart should be fertilized with a 1 dollar per service per month tax, that shall be put on deposit, to be invested in crude oil futures, with the profits being reinvested in real world applications that have a working, professional constituency.

Mark Dykeman · 1 year ago

Or maybe we need to use the Tip Jar widget on everything?