Despite the fact that blogging started as a means for people to post their most private thoughts in a public forum, it has evolved into a semi-automatic marketing tool to drive traffic to web sites. Since emerging from the primordial bit bucket, the erstwhile weblog's fingers have morphed into hairy spidery legs. Once upon a time, the weblog operated by way of keyboard; today, it crawls through the Worldwide Web. The vestigial finger limbs still function, though their efficiency pales in comparison to its modern counterparts.
Je pense, donc je suis
One of the earlier inefficiencies of weblogs was the mental block. Although ideas bounced around freely in the primitive weblog's brain, translating the synapses into meaningful finger-clicking sequences had become onerous. If the weblog were to survive, it had to adapt.
The Purrfect Storm
As weblogs proliferated, they segregated into distinct branches of their family tree. Seth Godin (a highly evolved form of this species) enumerated these categories in his e-book, Who's There:
- Cat Blogs
- Boss Blogs
- Viral Blogs
Cat blogs represent the purest bloodline, tracing their roots all the way back to Justin Hall. These are personal ruminations, nothing more, nothing less.
Boss blogs, which inter-bred with the mimeograph, represent a new form of top-down communication.
Viral blogs are the ones who banged the rocks together. They are digital mutations that threaten to validate the fear that computers will soon take over the world.
"can ya hear me? You're headed right for the middle of the monster!"
Robopsychology
The idea behind viral blogs actually began with Dave Winer, who started the whole ping business. With a single stroke, ping gave birth to the self-replicating, cross-referencing, chromosome 23 superblog. This beast hosts a raft of parasites, all of which enhance the spread of its digital seed:
- Syndication
- Trackback
- Blogroll
- PodCast
- Clouds
First, Do No Harm
Will the viral blog make us rich and famous? Will it talk to the coffeemaker? Or will it simply consume us all?
Time will tell.
Link to this blog.
Cogito, Ergo Sum
Latin is a dead language, it's dead as it can be. First it killed the Romans, and now it's killing me! Technorati is a robot and it's taking over my blog!
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