DISQUS

I agree with you David but I think it is important to make a distinction between what you call ‘Roblogs' and blogs that are written for a living. I doubt if there is any discussion about the value of automated blogs/twitter accounts/websites etc… they are often full of SPAM content. There lifespan is also not expected to be long, they are to make a 'quick buck' and then disappear into oblivion. That's why they are automated, so 1000s can be made.

Blogs that are written by real human beings though are the ones that should have critical boundaries. Those lie differently for each blogger and that is why I wrote this post.

I completely agree with you that Pro-Blogging is a valid business/profession. Though there is a fine line between writing for money and selling out your integrity. I believe for many bloggers this line is either vague or nonexistent. You can write for readers and search engines at the same time. You can do this by offering content that has value to the reader and incorporate your sites keywords for search engines. I am currently doing this by setting up a few blogs with the intention to make money. They are situated in popular niches and I write for them with search engines in the back of my mind, however I do offer my readers value.

The issue I find most pressing at the moment is attacks to other bloggers for the sheer reason of getting your blog noticed.

I would love to agree with you on that but unfortunately my experience has taught me otherwise. You are right the obvious spammers who are now following thousands of people will slowly be filtered out. People are smart enough to not follow them or to just click the unfollow button. What is my concern is that Twitter might have the same fate as blogging. That there will be an underlying thought of marketing in Twitter messages. That automation will become more subtle and in the end Twitter Marketing will become profitable enough to be a real business. If this is necessarily a bad thing is for everyone to think about themselves. I am still undecided about it.

Thank you! Your use of Twitter is exactly what I have been advocating since I have been on it. Once that method will spread, Twitter will either become of greater value or it will dilute into a place of clever marketing spam. What you can see throughout the few years that "Web 2.0" sites have sprung into existence is that initially they often are of great value. Sites like Digg.com offered new and interesting links that you had no doubt about but to follow, these days you think twice about clicking through because a lot of it is clever marketing. I am curious to see:

- If Twitter will break through the early adopters barrier.
- If it does, if it will dilute, segregate or offer real value.

There are a lot of blogs out there that offer no value: "circular, irritating, and useless". However I am inclined to say that I don't have to read them and therefore their existence is okay.

What is my main objection against useless content is that it often ranks high in the search engines. Instead of complaining about that, I am working on developing a new type of search engine which should overcome these algorithmic limitations (more about this in the future).

Hi David,

Your reasons to start blogging are the ones that are valuable and should be uphold by more bloggers, unfortunately they are not. I have the tendency to say that the number of successful bloggers is proportionally related to those who blog for numbers. "An outlet for opinions, observances, and connections to like-minded individuals." is exactly why blogs are so valuable.

No offence taken at your opinion. I can see where you are coming from but my opinion differs. Social Media has become a field of study on its own, just like there are authors blogging about writing. You are right to say that there is a lot of content without value being added to blogs, like posts about "Twitter clones". Often these are the authors who are not blogging for the right reasons. However I believe a critical post that discusses Twitter and comes with new arguments is valuable.

The classification of a valuable blog post is for me reading something that offers a new view on things.

Eiso

This 'cranking' out out of content seems to be the problem. I have been at the head of a project where we hired article writers to populate blogs. When we paid them we didn't ask for great articles, neither were we looking for the best writers, we were looking for cheap keyword rich content. Advertising revenue came but visitors never stayed longer then 30 seconds on the site. It wasn't spam because we were offering real human written content but it was written with more of a focus towards Search Engine Algorithms then the reader. This is why I believe search is broken, as long as this will be a booming business people will continue to write for them.

A new advertising way which is unobtrusive and at the same time interactive. I hope this new inniative will become a success, because for advertisers you can now interactively target a potential consumer. From promoting a facebook application within another facebook app to having a mortgage calculator on a finance site. The ability to be able to have whatever you want within the overlay will open a whole new world of posibilities to online advertising. My only concern is that publisher will shy away from this Ad Network because if it becomes highly targeted it may overshadow their own website. Ofcourse not a problem if the publishers are paid well ;-).