2 July 2009

Laura McKenna’s take on the current state of blogging (via Adam Kotsko), especially the bit on the decline of linking culture among weblogs, seems to me, too, quite apt. But I would add that part of the reason for the shift is probably also a change in the way people tend to read blogs. I get my miscellaneous interesting links almost exclusively from Facebook now (and, I suppose, from Kottke); blogs I read for the commentary. If a blog posts very many links with only a sentence or two of commentary, as happened much more commonly in the old days, it’s off my reader almost immediately. The same goes for the theoblogging equivalent: blockquote after blockquote from whatever random thinker one happens to be reading that day. I don’t think my habits are terribly uncommon on this point.

As readers have looked to blogs more and more for substance, and not just links, the burden to ‘be fresh’ has grown proportionately. A link and a parroted word of approval, even with a word or two of elaboration, generally falls on deaf ears. (Interestingly, though, McKenna’s original post has spawned quite of few posts in just this genre [1, 2, 3]—just like it would have in 2002!)

The social web has grown up, and blogging has changed along with it. To keep the old linking culture alive, what we need now is to maintain blogging as a conversational medium more than simply a broadcasting one.

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Tags: Blogging