The future will be blogged
What is blogging?
A ‘blog’ is the term for a web log, or an online diary. Like traditional diaries, blogs are updated frequently (often every day) and are arranged chronologically. Unlike traditional diaries, the world can read what you post. Blogging is therefore a process that can reflect the development of someone’s thinking on any given subject. The success of blogging is partly attributable to the ease of use; adding to a blog is as easy as writing an email or a text message (both, incidentally, very popular yet very basic technologies). To add to a blog the blogger gives the post a title - like the subject line of an email - and then writes some kind of comment, which could be an opinion, an account of what’s happened recently, a link to another site; anything, really. Blogs aren’t just about words: Moblogging is also possible, where pictures taken with a mobile phone can be instantly - and automatically - posted to a blog.
The signs are clear: there approximately 50 million blogs and more are created each day - 175,000 according to recent figures; universities are encouraging their students to blog (Warwick University is a good example); Google, Microsoft, AOL, Ask and Yahoo are some of the internet heavyweights investing in blogging services; and a Google search of the word ‘blog’ turns up fifteen times more results than ‘Beatles’. You can be sure that the technology is here to stay.
Why should you care?
As a student of media, you should care about blogs because they present a challenge to traditional forms of media. In common with many forms of new media they are democratic; for example, anyone can offer their opinion on the day’s news and have that opinion read by a worldwide audience. Blogs can even act as a check on the traditional media by offering news that isn’t reported elsewhere or by challenging factual information. The multiplicity of voices in the blogosphere offers a challenge to the received wisdom of traditional media outlets. The authenticity and unmediated nature of a blog is often its most appealing virtue. Others see blogs in a more negative light, arguing that they can be opinionated, biased and unaccountable. I’d go further by stating that blogs can also be self-indulgent, boring, and poorly written. But that doesn’t mean that they can’t also be informative, powerful, and worthy of serious study.
Traditional media have tended to focus on the political aspects of blogging. November 2003’s presidential election in America is said to have been influenced by blogging, and a storyline in The West Wing has reflected the growing acceptance of blogging in mainstream media. Blogging enfranchises groups who may be denied a voice elsewhere and can undermine those outlets that may have seemed more influential. You shouldn’t be deceived by the idea of a powerless lone voice; postings in blogs often get blogged elsewhere, rapidly spreading ideas and information. Earlier this year, during an off-the-record panel discussion, CNN news executive Eason Jordan allegedly said he knew the US military were targeting journalists in Iraq, something mainstream media didn’t report (journalists were at the discussion). Instead, a blogger posted the allegation and two weeks later, after lots of discussion in the blogosphere and traditional media, Jordan resigned. When considered in this context, every blogger can be a reporter and fewer stories can be covered up.
For some time now, interest in blogging has been growing and the contents of blogs are increasingly being appropriated by traditional media. ‘Salam Pax’ is the pseudonym for a blogger who documented life in the Iraqi capital Baghdad before and during the run up to the recent war. The blog is now available as a book, and it is a good example of an ‘ordinary’ voice taking on greater significance in the wake of global events. ‘Belle de Jour’, a blog supposedly written by a high class London call-girl, is now also a published book and is soon to be dramatised for TV by Channel 4. Blogging has also got people in trouble. As well as the CNN example above, a flight attendant, a US senator’s secretary, a bookseller and a worker at Google have all lost their jobs recently for their blogging exploits. More seriously, some regimes - including Iran - have sought to clamp down on bloggers by denying access to the internet and imprisonment.
How to use blogging
Setting up a blog is easy so there’s no excuse not to put the technology to use. I’d recommend either www.blogger.com or www.wordpress.com
Once registered with a site you can usually create more than one blog, handy if you plan to use blogging for more than one subject. Also, many blogging services offer to chance to collaborate on blogs, perfect for encouraging group working and the sharing of ideas.
Students
You should blog any of your work that involves recording your progression or gathering information.
- Many of you may be researching new media technologies, arguably the best place to start. If you read something of interest post a link to it with a brief comment explaining why it’s useful (a ‘linklog’). By the time the exam comes, you’ll have plenty of material ready to revise from instead of last-minute, random web searching.
- The same is true of the A2 research units. As well as blogging links you can record your reactions to films, any reading you’ve done, and the findings from interviews and focus groups. Anything you would have recorded on paper you can record in a blog, without losing it! You might also find people will leave useful comments.
- The blogging of your progress for any production work will also be incredibly handy when it comes to writing your evaluation; remember, you need to account for technical decisions and revisions, so an on-going record will be more accurate than your memory. You can also photoblog screenshots of your progress when image editing or designing page layouts. If working collaboratively, you could use a team blog so each member of the group can contribute.
- If you’re studying AQA English Literature you can blog you wide reading for the synoptic unit. Use your blog to record quotations, ideas, and your reaction to the texts you read.
Teachers
As well as helping to organise your students’ work, blogs can be used to keep track of their progress, and allow you to provide feedback by leaving comments. They can also be used to encourage collaborative working.
- Any blog can act as a record of the work students have done, and some allow users to set up an alert to a specified email address - yours - each time the blog is updated. Also, small programmes are available that will tell you when blogs you are interested in are updated. Now you can see what students are doing and when.
- Essays can also be posted to the blog, allowing you to mark them by leaving comments.
- Alternatively, or additionally, your students can comment on each other’s essays, helping them to improve by studying the work of their peers.
- Swap addresses with another school or college and then your students can share ideas with a wider audience.
- Your class notes can be posted in a blog enabling students missing lessons to catch up, and you can use it as a record of the homework you have set.
Finally, a note of warning: blogging can be addictive!
Glossary
Blog - The term for a ‘web log’, an online diary.
Blogging - Posting to a blog is blogging.
Blogger - A person who writes a blog.
Blogosphere - The blogging world or community.
Moblogging - Blogging from a mobile phone.
Photoblogging - A blog based on photographs rather than words.
Post - As a noun, an entry in a blog. As a verb, the act of adding to a blog.
