Rich Ord has a point when he says that there’s a lot of hype surrounding blogs. But just because they’re being hyped like crazy doesn’t mean that they’re not a genuinely exciting step forward. Even if you don’t believe the hype - you have to admit that blogs are a robust and powerful communications tool for businesses.
That’s why Ord’s recent post entitled, “Blogs are Just Websites, Stupid,” misses the point. Yes the technological components behind blogging are very similar to those behind websites, but the key differences - RSS and permalinking - enable behaviors and a culture that go way beyond the technology, and the hype.
Eventually, we hope that having a blog will be as commonplace for businesses as having a website. But even then, blogs and websites will play different roles within a larger communications plan. Websites will inform, blogs will engage. Websites will showcase, blogs will converse and debate. Web sites will remain a part of command and control “messaging” while blogs will level with customers in an authentic way.
It’s not the technology. It’s what it enables.
{ 4 comments… read them below or add one }
Mike M 02.28.06 at 9:29 am
Amen! I agree with you. Focusing on the technology is not the point. Blogging allows for easy update and fresh content, it provides benefits from a search engine standpoint, it provides a better mechanism to “talk” with customers, it also has the “image” of being less ’sales-y’ and more personal. and more….
Jason 02.28.06 at 11:25 am
I agree and I disagree.
From a technical standpoint, blogs essentially are “just websites.” There’s nothing you can do on a blog engine that you can’t do on the site engine running the NYT. And in the end, the only real difference between joeschmoe.com and joe schmoe’s blog is that you don’t have to visit the blog to find out if there’s something new there.
That being said, I’d argue that the buzz around blogs has created an entirely new category of web site - blogs. I love blogs. I love how they make a web community and I read (and write!) many of them religiously.
So yes, they’re both just web sites. But they serve very different purposes.
alex 02.28.06 at 3:57 pm
Radically different from websites! Blogs are radically different from websites. Period.
Blogs are enablers for people to express opinions, share content, exchange views, interact and even transact. They are people-driven dynamic content… Not dynamic in the technical sense of the word (i.e. connected to databases and generating content based on user requests), but rather dynamic in the sense of “group dynamics”. Blogs enable opinions, images, ideas to emerge. They are transforming marketing and business in a major and revolutionary manner. Blogs bring us one step closer to the world described in “Surfing on the Edge of Chaos” and that’s bloody exciting.
Radically different IMHO!
Jason 02.28.06 at 8:28 pm
I agree — blogs are doing all of these things (and will probably do more unexpected and cool things in the future), but the fundamental difference between your “blogs” and your “websites” is the way people use them.
Blogging is entirely people-driven, as are most things “web 2.0,” but that doesn’t mean that a blog isn’t just a web site. If you need proof of that - just think of how many examples you can come up with where a company’s web site is a blog! Weblogs INC - blog. Union Square Ventures - blog. Federated Media - blog.
What is Blogger but Geocities revisited? What’s changed is how easy it is for people to create, change, and maintain personal web sites. And this is a wonderful thing - but I think it’s valid to remember that a blog is really not so technically different than a host of other (free) site engies. It’s just easier.