Joseph Goebbels claimed nearly a century ago that it is the absolute right of the state to supervise the formation of public opinion, to attract followers and to keep them in line but today it seems as if it is the privilege of every computer-literate individual. The publishing of one’s opinion has never before been as simple as it is today as even a monkey can do it and I believe that at least a few monkeys ought to have a blog somewhere in the cyber-jungle called the blogosphere.
According to Technorati approximately 184 million Internet users have started a blog and 77 % of active Internet users follow blogs. Bloggers vary from professional marketing writers to independent journalists and from academic opinion leaders to narcissists and their blogs vary alike. There are blogs for every theme and every area from everyday life to rocket science and from politics to porn. The majority of people blog from the comfort of their homes while many use various mobile devices from netbooks to smartphones. For example, I follow a number of general blogs of friends to keep track of their activities and thematic blogs on ICT, human resources, marketing and religion in order to stay atop of my career. Even though, I do not have a personal blog, I manage blogs for the European YWCA and contribute regularly through the European Youth Forum's blog-based working environment.
In my opinion, the impact of blogosphere today can be compared in many ways to the role of radio at the beginning of the twentieth century: they both can be considered the novelty media of their time, as they cover a vast scope of interests, their main usage boost comes from war and people’s urge to hear news about the course of it, as they both bring fresher and more accurate news more instantly and with less interference from censorship than the media channels dominant in their era and also in the beginning they both were led by independent enthusiasts doing it for the sake of their medium, being later discovered by the corporations and taken to the masses.
As a social medium, the blog carries many unique characteristics that can be successfully used by various interest groups and stakeholders for their own ends. Irrelevantly, the blog viewers tend to correspond to the message similar to P2P relations, as the origin of the message is not questioned, while the news media gets a more filtered approach. The bloggers, compared to journalists, are considered as one among us vs them and the merchandising via blogs is far more tolerated and successful than merchandising in e.g. a soap opera . That has led to a phenomena called Me 2.0 - mainly web and new media based successful self-merchandising, with strong emphasis placed on a personal blog, trackbacks in right places and comments to and from the right audience. As can be seen for example from the success stories of Cece Lee Simmons and Petra Epp Petrone.
That said, I still prefer to use blogs as an HR and training management tool rather than public medium, as it provides me the unique ability to hold minutes or discussions on given topics and to keep track of events and opinions me and my co-workers, with embedded videos, audio files and feedbacks and post study materials and to hold discussions with the trainees. However, if the events and occasions should demand a news medium, a blog would be the new medium of choice.
To conclude: I believe that the blogosphere is a miniature but growing image of our society, with the scent of wonderland and Byronian hero mindset where each and everyone can create a small private world that reflects life through their eyes. But the secret here lies in getting the others to mind – the question is whether there is a reflection at all if nobody sees it?
According to Technorati approximately 184 million Internet users have started a blog and 77 % of active Internet users follow blogs. Bloggers vary from professional marketing writers to independent journalists and from academic opinion leaders to narcissists and their blogs vary alike. There are blogs for every theme and every area from everyday life to rocket science and from politics to porn. The majority of people blog from the comfort of their homes while many use various mobile devices from netbooks to smartphones. For example, I follow a number of general blogs of friends to keep track of their activities and thematic blogs on ICT, human resources, marketing and religion in order to stay atop of my career. Even though, I do not have a personal blog, I manage blogs for the European YWCA and contribute regularly through the European Youth Forum's blog-based working environment.
In my opinion, the impact of blogosphere today can be compared in many ways to the role of radio at the beginning of the twentieth century: they both can be considered the novelty media of their time, as they cover a vast scope of interests, their main usage boost comes from war and people’s urge to hear news about the course of it, as they both bring fresher and more accurate news more instantly and with less interference from censorship than the media channels dominant in their era and also in the beginning they both were led by independent enthusiasts doing it for the sake of their medium, being later discovered by the corporations and taken to the masses.
As a social medium, the blog carries many unique characteristics that can be successfully used by various interest groups and stakeholders for their own ends. Irrelevantly, the blog viewers tend to correspond to the message similar to P2P relations, as the origin of the message is not questioned, while the news media gets a more filtered approach. The bloggers, compared to journalists, are considered as one among us vs them and the merchandising via blogs is far more tolerated and successful than merchandising in e.g. a soap opera . That has led to a phenomena called Me 2.0 - mainly web and new media based successful self-merchandising, with strong emphasis placed on a personal blog, trackbacks in right places and comments to and from the right audience. As can be seen for example from the success stories of Cece Lee Simmons and Petra Epp Petrone.
That said, I still prefer to use blogs as an HR and training management tool rather than public medium, as it provides me the unique ability to hold minutes or discussions on given topics and to keep track of events and opinions me and my co-workers, with embedded videos, audio files and feedbacks and post study materials and to hold discussions with the trainees. However, if the events and occasions should demand a news medium, a blog would be the new medium of choice.
To conclude: I believe that the blogosphere is a miniature but growing image of our society, with the scent of wonderland and Byronian hero mindset where each and everyone can create a small private world that reflects life through their eyes. But the secret here lies in getting the others to mind – the question is whether there is a reflection at all if nobody sees it?
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