Jim Karpen Tips

July 2001

I have you to thank. I kept hearing about weblogs and so used my weekly Internet column as an excuse to spend some time investigating this area of Internet culture. I came away intrigued--and am considering becoming a blogger myself.

A weblog is like a public diary that you post to the Internet. Some people do indeed write their innermost thoughts every day. At the other end of the spectrum are weblogs on specific topics, such as the one I read every day related to the Pocket PC.

Internet diary writing began way back in the early days of the Internet about six years ago. Keeping a daily log entailed creating a new version of a web page and uploading it. But in recent years the whole process has become streamlined. You simply type some information into a form and click send, and then your web site is automatically updated.

Every day I read Jason Dunn's PocketPCThoughts.Com because I write professionally about the Pocket PC. He and a partner post from three to ten updates a day regarding new software, helpful articles online, new web sites, etc. I find it an easy way to follow the industry. And I always wondered how his site worked. Now I know it's simply a weblog.

But most of those who write weblogs (or "blogs," as they're also known) seem to be either people working in the tech industry or teens and young adults spilling their feelings online.

Blogger.Com is apparently the most popular, with over 100,000 people having used the service. There's absolutely no organization there that I could find. The directory just seems to list thousands of diaries in several different and not very useful ways. Click one at random and see what you get. They don't even list the most popular, though apparently some blogs have had such compelling stories or are written by such thoughtful bloggers that they have become somewhat famous.

I looked at several of the blogs listed on Blogger.com and thought that the writing was, surprise, somewhat effective. But obviously you get the whole range, and another one that I looked at was semiliterate.

These services are typically free. Blogger.Com offers you a free, web-based tool, called "Blogger," that helps you publish to the web whenever the urge strikes. While Blogger is the leading tool in this rapidly growing area, Blogger.Com doesn't host your weblog--you need to find another hosting service for that. Many people use the free BlogSpot.com.

Two other services seem to be simpler, because they offer both easy posting tools and free hosting: DiaryLand and LiveJournal.Com. DiaryLand and other sites let you pick an address such as <yourname.diaryland.com>.

© 2001 by Jim Karpen, Ph.D. (#273)