Here at Web-Empire we specialise in blogs; setting them up, showing you how to get the most out of them and indeed how to use them. But what is a blog?

“Blog” is a contraction of web-log and can be veiwed as an online diary. A fuller description of what a blog is can be found in our glossary. The concept of a blog is a pretty obvious one; put any writter or diariest online and it was bound to happen sooner or later. This means the origin of blogs and when the first arose is a vague and grey area.

They have also now taken on a life of their own as, unlike diaries kept in the traditional sense, they are interactive – people read them, and people comment on them in direct response to what ever has been posted that day. The original author may then respond and discussions, debates and even full blown arguments may ensue!

The ability to link directly to information that may be interesting or support a cause is also a new dimension for the diariest and journalist to contend with. This can lead to a sort of community where everybody knows somebody who knows somebody – thus mirroring social structure.

Blogs are also highly versatile and capable of having more than one person adding posts. This leads them to being useful for larger organisations as well as the individual, and businesses may set one up for a specific project.

They are searchable in a way books are not. They can have catagories in which posts are placed so if you are interested in all of the posts containing Fruit you can just click on the catagory fruit. And unlike books with contents pages each post can be in multiply catagories and so they act similarly to an index as well.

Another way that many blogs have of searching their contents is the archive, this has everything listed in the month, year etc… when it was posted.

Journalisim, either professional or what is termed Citizen Journalism, is another use of the blog which has grown in popularity. People like Tom Renolds have even had book deals out of it. (By the way we recommend his book).

Blogs are used in many ways and have a huge potential. There is much more to be said on the matter which we at Web-Empire will be addressing shortly. Until then, have a good week.