Are blogs generally pointless?

faceman

What do ye think of blogs? I can understand celebrity blogs or dj's etc havin semi popular blogs but the general public, are they read?

Do you read your friend's blogs?

I read a random blog the other day by some medical student. He was talkin about somethin and quoted in it "..to my regular readers..." and i was wondering who they really were?

What do ye think? Are there good blogs online that you read regularly?

aidan_walsh

Blogs are only pointless to the people who are not the intended audience.

Silverfish

I hardly ever read them, just a select few. I have two myself, and I'm assured people read them, but for what reason I have no idea, they tend to be just 'Stuff stuff bllaaarrghh stuff' and make very little sense to anyone.

But I suppose its the same for everyone, you think or feel things and its not enough to just scribble it in a diary, you need to put it somewhere where people will see it, for posterity, or something.

AdMMM

There are certainly some excellent blogs out there. I used to review blogs for a fairly well known site and some of the blogs that I covered were spectacular. Although admittedly, because it's so easy to set-up your own blog these days and people have a genuine chance to earn money from Ad programs like AdSense, many have been lured into the blogosphere despite not having the slightest idea about what to write about.

constitutionus

in a word . yes.

outside media types and the advertising fraternity no one genuinely knows what a blog is let alone reads em. ive been farting around on the net for the last 2 yrs now and can hand on heart say ive never read a one.

i do like the idea of them and im sure if your looking for a point of view outside of the establishment line from areas like palestine and iraq theyre a godsend but i doubt most people from say dublin would read the blog of someone else from dublin because they'd pretty much be saying the same thing theyve experienced that very same day. but in the whole schemes of things in the main theyre useless.

aidan_walsh

outside media types and the advertising fraternity no one genuinely knows what a blog is let alone reads em.

Utter tosh.

Ruu_Old

I read a few that are on the front page of journals.ie from time to time and the one where Silverfish was ranting about Electronic Arts. *claps*

Wertz

I used hate them and the seeming attention whores that thought we (the internet) wanted to read their sorry little musings about sh*t that is of little consequence, but over the years, I've come across some very well written and informative articles on them and have changed my attitude toward them.
That's not to say that there isn't some sanctimonious self interested crap out there...but I think social networking sites have diverted the flow of dross and only people who are serious about trying to put out a message to a global audience are actually churning out topics on their blogs.

I find most of them through google when searching something and most of the time, especially when it comes to reviews of stuff they tend to be a lot better written, have the details I need and are less likely to be shilling (once you check other postings.

Don't know if I'd ever bother writing one...I couldn't for the life of me think of anything to put in it except for self centred sh*t that I'd be 99% sure very few people would be arsed trying to read.

InFront

22 people read my blog on Friday. Well they probably didn't read it, but they definitely clicked on the page:D
I mostly read my friends' blogs. Reading the more personal blogs of people you don't know is usually a waste of time. Anyway isn't the person who most benefits from the blog usually the blogger himself?

nesf

It depends, you can use blogs/livejournals/xanga/whatever to keep in touch with friends who live abroad and such. I think you need to differentiate between different types of blogs tbh. My personal blog might be of interest to friends of mine who I don't get to see very often but to the general public it would be a complete waste of their time reading it.

faceman

InFront wrote:

22 people read my blog on Friday. Well they probably didn't read it, but they definitely clicked on the page:D

make that 23! but i got this page

Not Found

The requested URL /blog/50576 was not found on this server.

Talliesin

constitutionus wrote:

outside media types and the advertising fraternity no one genuinely knows what a blog is

Media and advertising types really don't get blogs. It's quite funny when they talk about them as if they do. Dunning-Kruger Effect in all its glory.

There are some good blogs that stay on a particular topic that are good if you have an interest in that particular topic.

There are some that are mainly of interest to the author's friends.

90% are crud, but then Sturgeons Law and all.

Hells_Belle

Lumping all blogs together to pose that question is like asking "are all books generally stupid?" There are different kinds of blogs, some of which may actually appeal to you.

There are topical blogs, so if you're interested in photography, a photo blog where someone posts photos and narrative about techniques might be of interest to you. Any number of parents enjoy reading parenting blogs for specific product recommendations and information about stuff like cloth vs fake nappies. Green people might like blogs that have photspreads on eco building and environmentally friendly products.

There are very few personal blogs I enjoy, but there are a handful I read regularly.

People certainly do read them. I write a blog with a friend around the topic of the virtual world Second Life. We have about 30,000 readers and deliver 6,500 pages a day and growing - so around 200,000 page views a day. Actually, now that I think about it, we're exactly one year old today so that's pretty good traction!

Savman

Blogs = the internet's sewerage system.
Don't see the point at all.

dSTAR

outside media types and the advertising fraternity no one genuinely knows what a blog is let alone reads em.

and

aidan_walsh wrote:

Utter tosh.

I find myself agreeing with you Aidan.

Or as Matt Cutts a Google software engineer once said...

There are millions of blogs out there, some of them have to be good.

All those people who claim that blogs are rubbish have probably come across some personal blog filled with lurid purple prose and concluded that all blogs were crap. Not all blogs are written by self obsessed attention whores.

Some people are making quite a bit of money writing professional blogs. Funny thing is that many first time visitors wouldn't even know it was a blog or a website. Most of the time people are searching for some particular information or answers and couldn't really care less how it is delivered.

Savman

Fair enough if it's something written by someone of interest it defo has its place, I wouldn't consider that "blogging" as such. I'm sure many actors/musicians or whatever have their own site with a blog which is a personal touch from the artist themselves. That's cool with me.

But "what i had for breakstiff" and "my trip to club m" I've no time for whatsoever.

aidan_walsh

Fair enough if it's something written by someone of interest it defo has its place, I wouldn't consider that "blogging" as such.

"Blogging" is nothing more than a name given to an article, opinion piece or any other form of written text published online, generally using software of a specific nature.

But "what i had for breakstiff" and "my trip to club m" I've no time for whatsoever.

Fine. Thats the dreggs of blogging. Writing off blogging as "the internet's sewerage system" and pointless based simply on those is akin to writing off cinema because of the Police Academy series.

dSTAR

Savman wrote:

But "what i had for breakstiff" and "my trip to club m" I've no time for whatsoever.

Ditto.

I have very little patience for this kind of drivel.

Savman

aidan_walsh wrote:

Writing off blogging as "the internet's sewerage system" and pointless based simply on those is akin to writing off cinema because of the Police Academy series.

Hey...HEY :mad:
I quite liked Police Academy, no need for that....

Too late in the night to be arguing over blogs man

InFront

Me too, remember the nerd. Freckle, was it? He was cool.

Talliesin

Savman wrote:

Fair enough if it's something written by someone of interest it defo has its place, I wouldn't consider that "blogging" as such.

So what you're saying is, that all blogs are crap, except for the good ones, which aren't really blogs, because if they were blogs you'd be wrong, so they aren't.

Your argument is bordering on "because, that's why!".

Black Swan

Like anything else on the web, there are a few with content, and many without.

BuffyBot

Blogs = the internet's sewerage system.
Don't see the point at all.

You could easily say the same thing about sites like boards.ie

Hells_Belle

BuffyBot wrote:

You could easily say the same thing about sites like boards.ie

I think the title of The Internet's Sewage System is reserved for Bebo. Its the mating of the worst of blog drivel and the worst of social networking software to create something that is simultaneously ugly, illiterate and utterly lacking in content.

Ahh to be 14 pretending to be 24 again! (Not so much with the 44 pretending to be 14 bit, though. Creeps.)

Kinetic^

Yes..............just like this thread!!!