January 5, 2006 - 4:38 P.M.
What is a "blog"?
Lately, I've noticed a few confused, plaintive cries for help around these parts. People are writing in the comments, clearly feeling a bit ... well ... left out, I suppose.
It seems that for many, blogs and blogging are a closed book. What is it? Who does that? And why?
Rather than try to boil up my own words, let's allow the venerable Wikipedia do the talking:
A blog is a website in which journal entries are posted on a regular basis and displayed in reverse chronological order. The term blog is a shortened form of weblog ... Authoring a blog, maintaining a blog or adding an article to an existing blog is called "blogging". Individual articles on a blog are called "blog posts," "posts" or "entries". A person who posts these entries is called a "blogger" ... Blogs use a conversational style ... The term "weblog" was coined by Jorn Barger on December 17, 1997. The short form, "blog," was coined by Peter Merholz. He broke the word weblog into the phrase "we blog" in the sidebar of his weblog in April or May of 1999. [read more]
Hope that's helpful. More from IT Blogwatch in about 14 hours ;-)
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