A Web Log (or just “blog”) is the broad term applied to the online
variant of the personal diary. Unlike diaries, blogs are intended to
be public. Thanks to the ease with which blogs can be put online,
people who have anything to say have eagerly jumped on the blog-
ging bandwagon, making blogs a powerful social networking tool,
and when combined with the power of the Internet, transcends
geographical borders. Putting one’s thoughts and ideas online
makes it easier to find like minded people to collaborate with
Uses of Blog
People blog for many reasons—some use it truly as an online
diary, detailing their lives. The mundane-ness of a blog entry is
what endears it to the readers—events that offer a slice of life of
a citizen in one countr y can be interesting to people in anoth-
er. Furthermore, the relative anonymity that the Net offers
allows even introverts to open up. Some blog to convey a mes-
sage to the world, especially when other channels are not avail-
able, or when revealing information through the usual chan-
nels would prove detrimental to their existence, as in the case
of Chinese bloggers.
Making the most of Blogs
As is the case with the search for any other topic on the Web, you
start off with a search engine. Two popular, specialised, blog
search engines are available at technorati.com and
blogsearch.google.com. Both sites offer an Advanced Search func-
tion and that is the best place to start. While technorati.com can
offer results based on “Authority”, which is an indicator of the
number of other blogs linking to it; blogsearch.google.com can
search on the Author field.
From the results thrown up, you pick one and land at a blog.
At first glance, the font size and colour, and the page background
colour should not jar the reading experience. The content you are
after preferably should be easily accessible without requiring a lot
of scrolling. The layout should not be difficult to comprehend
with too many links and ads strewn all over. The Page content
should not leave you feeling ambushed—as would be the case
when a couple of 500 KB images start loading, when all you were
expecting was a recipe.
People blog for many reasons—some use it truly as an online
diary, detailing their lives. The mundane-ness of a blog entry is
what endears it to the readers—events that offer a slice of life of
a citizen in one countr y can be interesting to people in anoth-
er. Furthermore, the relative anonymity that the Net offers
allows even introverts to open up. Some blog to convey a mes-
sage to the world, especially when other channels are not avail-
able, or when revealing information through the usual chan-
nels would prove detrimental to their existence, as in the case
of Chinese bloggers.
Types of Blog
The word “blog” give the impression that the account is textual in
nature, probably due to the association with the diary. But on the
Net, it is commonplace to see blogs with pictures (why type in a
thousand words when a picture will do?) called photo blogs. Video
blogs are a step further from Photoblogs (why put up a thousand
pictures when a video will do?). Audio blogs incorporate audio
clips (why type out a long message when it can be recorded and
played back?). All of the above are similar in the aspect that they
are the expression of personal opinion of a single entity, what dif-
fers is the medium of communication. Moblogging which is the
latest trend in this field of activity refers to reading and posting to
blogs via a mobile phone
The word “blog” give the impression that the account is textual in
nature, probably due to the association with the diary. But on the
Net, it is commonplace to see blogs with pictures (why type in a
thousand words when a picture will do?) called photo blogs. Video
blogs are a step further from Photoblogs (why put up a thousand
pictures when a video will do?). Audio blogs incorporate audio
clips (why type out a long message when it can be recorded and
played back?). All of the above are similar in the aspect that they
are the expression of personal opinion of a single entity, what dif-
fers is the medium of communication. Moblogging which is the
latest trend in this field of activity refers to reading and posting to
blogs via a mobile phone
Making the most of Blogs
As is the case with the search for any other topic on the Web, you
start off with a search engine. Two popular, specialised, blog
search engines are available at technorati.com and
blogsearch.google.com. Both sites offer an Advanced Search func-
tion and that is the best place to start. While technorati.com can
offer results based on “Authority”, which is an indicator of the
number of other blogs linking to it; blogsearch.google.com can
search on the Author field.
From the results thrown up, you pick one and land at a blog.
At first glance, the font size and colour, and the page background
colour should not jar the reading experience. The content you are
after preferably should be easily accessible without requiring a lot
of scrolling. The layout should not be difficult to comprehend
with too many links and ads strewn all over. The Page content
should not leave you feeling ambushed—as would be the case
when a couple of 500 KB images start loading, when all you were
expecting was a recipe.
Choosing A Blogging Platform And Host
To understand what features constitute a good platform it is best
to revert to our earlier discussion on making the most of the blo-
gosphere as a visitor. We can conclude that the following features
can be considered as visitor friendly:
1. Font Characteristics: Fonts should be large enough so that the
visitors do not have to squint to read the content. Font colours
for normal text and links should be such as to allow sufficient
contrast with the background.
2. Page Style: Garishly coloured pages are a put off; not many like
to read red text off a bright yellow page. But if the mood of the
blogger is a happy one, using a gloomy grey would also make it
difficult to connect with the reader.
3. Page Layout: The reading experience should not be marred by
an obstructive layout. Inserting ads right in the middle of the
post text is generally a bad idea, as is the practice of using a very
narrow post column leading to lot of scrolling. Having links to
important pages at the very bottom of a long page is as good as
not having them at all.
4. Page Content: Extraneous content can be blighting. While ads
are a conspicuous bloat, there are other less noticeable irritants.
A blog can be bogged down by the number of comments posted
by visitors. A page containing a two-sentence post followed by
100 comments will take time to load, testing the visitor’s
patience. Visitors to the site are more interested in what the
blogger has to say. SPAM messages that are not promptly weed-
ed out from the comments leave a bad impression. A page con-
taining 10 posts will not only take time to load, but also will
increase the time taken to dig down to the interesting post.
Having one page per post would preclude this effort.
Visitor Aids: Visitors should have easy access to links to book-
mark the blog, for example to sites like del.icio.us. They should
also be given a chance to subscribe to the blogs feeds so that
they can remain updated about changes to it. Visitors appreciate
the ability to voice their opinion about the blog through the
comment box. They should not be made to wade through all the
posts in search of a specific entry. Posts need to be tagged/cate-
gorised relevant to their content. A search box which saves a lot
of effort for the visitor is a must, especially if there are a lot of
posts. Easy access to previous posts or preferably a calendar
showing the dates in which the blogger has made a post is also
recommended.
6. Optionals: A blog is best known by the blogroll it keeps, (just as
a person is best known by the company he keeps). Linking to
other blogs also keeps the visitor exploring the blogosphere. But
caution needs to be exercised when it comes to linking to other
blogs in the post—in some cases, the habit could lead to a frus-
trating experience to the reader, if the actual source of the infor-
mation is one click too far away. So rather than add one more
link to an already long chain of blog links, it is better to link to
the actual source of information—even if you were led to it
through another blog.
To understand what features constitute a good platform it is best
to revert to our earlier discussion on making the most of the blo-
gosphere as a visitor. We can conclude that the following features
can be considered as visitor friendly:
1. Font Characteristics: Fonts should be large enough so that the
visitors do not have to squint to read the content. Font colours
for normal text and links should be such as to allow sufficient
contrast with the background.
2. Page Style: Garishly coloured pages are a put off; not many like
to read red text off a bright yellow page. But if the mood of the
blogger is a happy one, using a gloomy grey would also make it
difficult to connect with the reader.
3. Page Layout: The reading experience should not be marred by
an obstructive layout. Inserting ads right in the middle of the
post text is generally a bad idea, as is the practice of using a very
narrow post column leading to lot of scrolling. Having links to
important pages at the very bottom of a long page is as good as
not having them at all.
4. Page Content: Extraneous content can be blighting. While ads
are a conspicuous bloat, there are other less noticeable irritants.
A blog can be bogged down by the number of comments posted
by visitors. A page containing a two-sentence post followed by
100 comments will take time to load, testing the visitor’s
patience. Visitors to the site are more interested in what the
blogger has to say. SPAM messages that are not promptly weed-
ed out from the comments leave a bad impression. A page con-
taining 10 posts will not only take time to load, but also will
increase the time taken to dig down to the interesting post.
Having one page per post would preclude this effort.
Visitor Aids: Visitors should have easy access to links to book-
mark the blog, for example to sites like del.icio.us. They should
also be given a chance to subscribe to the blogs feeds so that
they can remain updated about changes to it. Visitors appreciate
the ability to voice their opinion about the blog through the
comment box. They should not be made to wade through all the
posts in search of a specific entry. Posts need to be tagged/cate-
gorised relevant to their content. A search box which saves a lot
of effort for the visitor is a must, especially if there are a lot of
posts. Easy access to previous posts or preferably a calendar
showing the dates in which the blogger has made a post is also
recommended.
6. Optionals: A blog is best known by the blogroll it keeps, (just as
a person is best known by the company he keeps). Linking to
other blogs also keeps the visitor exploring the blogosphere. But
caution needs to be exercised when it comes to linking to other
blogs in the post—in some cases, the habit could lead to a frus-
trating experience to the reader, if the actual source of the infor-
mation is one click too far away. So rather than add one more
link to an already long chain of blog links, it is better to link to
the actual source of information—even if you were led to it
through another blog.
Blogger
Blogger—the platform—was the creation of Pyra Labs, which was
later bought by Google. After the buyout, Blogger was offered as a
totally free blogging service at blogger.com by Google (Pyra Labs
offered the service in two variants with only the paid version offer-
ing all the features). Blogger.com only forms the client and plat-
form part of the blog, the blog needs to be hosted on a server.
While Google will be glad to host the blog for you at blogspot.com
(your blog site will be xyz.blogspot.com), you are free to configure
blogger to publish the blog on another server. Interestingly, blog-
ger.com will post to any ordinary Web host and doesn’t require any
add-ons like a database etc.
Google has successfully integrated few of its other services
with blogger.com. Users of blogger.com can easily include Google
AdSense ads to make money from the blog. It is also possible to
blog from Google Docs and Spreadsheets.
You need to sign up with blogger.com to be able to use the
client. Blogger offers two client options—the classic and the
updated. The updated client offers greater customisation options
compared to the classic one. After sign up you are given the option
to choose where to host the blog. In case you would like to host the
blog elsewhere the details have to be provided in the “Advanced
Blog Setup” at this stage. Blogger.com uses FTP or Secure FTP to
transfer the files to the server, so these details need to be entered
in the relevant fields. In all other cases, the blog is hosted at
blogspot.com, you need to choose a unique name for the blog
before you can proceed.
In the next step you are given a rash of templates to choose from.
This can be changed or tweaked later on. After the template selec-
tion, your blog is ready. Just like that. You can visit the blog imme-
diately, but there would be nothing else there besides the title.
Wordpress
Wordpress is an open source blogging platform. It is available
freely hosted at wordpress.com, where you can create a blog right
away, and the platform code is available for download at word-
press.org, which is its development site. If you are well versed with
PHP, MySQL and Web server administration, you can roll your own
WordPress blog by downloading the WordPress setup files from
Wordpress.org, and uploading them to a Web server. WordPress is
free for non commercial use; the rest can use the freely hosted ver-
sion at wordpress.com. While the blog platform is not feature lim-
ited, the blog host has limitations for the free version. What fol-
lows is the review of the features of WordPress as it is available at
wordpress.com.
To be able to try WordPress (WP), you need to signup for a free
account at wordpress.com. After signing up and selecting a unique
name for the blog, you are taken to the blog’s dashboard. Here you
can see the various activities that you can do with the blog. The
blog statistics offers information about the visitors to your blog,
Wordpress client and the Feed statistics does the same to the subscribers
of your site’s RSS feed. Besides individual blog statistics, the dash board
also keeps track of your activities across the wordpress.com blogos-
phere. The comments you made on another blog are tracked under
the “My comments” link. The Tag Surfer link allows you to be
informed every time anyone with a WP blog posts under that tag.
totally free blogging service at blogger.com by Google (Pyra Labs
offered the service in two variants with only the paid version offer-
ing all the features). Blogger.com only forms the client and plat-
form part of the blog, the blog needs to be hosted on a server.
While Google will be glad to host the blog for you at blogspot.com
(your blog site will be xyz.blogspot.com), you are free to configure
blogger to publish the blog on another server. Interestingly, blog-
ger.com will post to any ordinary Web host and doesn’t require any
add-ons like a database etc.
Google has successfully integrated few of its other services
with blogger.com. Users of blogger.com can easily include Google
AdSense ads to make money from the blog. It is also possible to
blog from Google Docs and Spreadsheets.
You need to sign up with blogger.com to be able to use the
client. Blogger offers two client options—the classic and the
updated. The updated client offers greater customisation options
compared to the classic one. After sign up you are given the option
to choose where to host the blog. In case you would like to host the
blog elsewhere the details have to be provided in the “Advanced
Blog Setup” at this stage. Blogger.com uses FTP or Secure FTP to
transfer the files to the server, so these details need to be entered
in the relevant fields. In all other cases, the blog is hosted at
blogspot.com, you need to choose a unique name for the blog
before you can proceed.
In the next step you are given a rash of templates to choose from.
This can be changed or tweaked later on. After the template selec-
tion, your blog is ready. Just like that. You can visit the blog imme-
diately, but there would be nothing else there besides the title.
Wordpress
Wordpress is an open source blogging platform. It is available
freely hosted at wordpress.com, where you can create a blog right
away, and the platform code is available for download at word-
press.org, which is its development site. If you are well versed with
PHP, MySQL and Web server administration, you can roll your own
WordPress blog by downloading the WordPress setup files from
Wordpress.org, and uploading them to a Web server. WordPress is
free for non commercial use; the rest can use the freely hosted ver-
sion at wordpress.com. While the blog platform is not feature lim-
ited, the blog host has limitations for the free version. What fol-
lows is the review of the features of WordPress as it is available at
wordpress.com.
To be able to try WordPress (WP), you need to signup for a free
account at wordpress.com. After signing up and selecting a unique
name for the blog, you are taken to the blog’s dashboard. Here you
can see the various activities that you can do with the blog. The
blog statistics offers information about the visitors to your blog,
Wordpress client and the Feed statistics does the same to the subscribers
of your site’s RSS feed. Besides individual blog statistics, the dash board
also keeps track of your activities across the wordpress.com blogos-
phere. The comments you made on another blog are tracked under
the “My comments” link. The Tag Surfer link allows you to be
informed every time anyone with a WP blog posts under that tag.
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