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Blogging 101: What's a blog?

Blogging has come a long way, it used to be an obscure thing kids did in the Internets. These days blogging is a big thing and the internet is lousy with blogs, and Big Name Bloggers.
Blogging 101: What's a blog?
Photo by Daniel Thomas / Unsplash

This is a first in a series of articles about blogging.
After my post: Notes on a Talk: Blogging 101, I’ve had questions about blogging from my friends.

I’m not an expert, nor am I a Big Name Blogger. I’ve only had the privilege of starting a blog before it was popular (yes, okay, I am kind of a hipster, we can all stop laughing now). I’ve maintained a blog on and off through the years, and I’ve followed some pretty interesting people through their blogs.

I think I can safely say I know a bit about blogging, and its a medium that I hold above any social media including Twitter, and Facebook because blogging started before Facebook was a spark in Mark Zuckerberg’s eye. Even Twitter’s Obvious Corp Founders started with the creation of Blogger.com
Blogs survived Multiply and Friendster. I think its safe to say that blogs are here to stay.

Blogging has come a long way, it used to be an obscure thing kids did in the Internets. These days blogging is a big thing and the internet is lousy with blogs, and Big Name Bloggers.

I have a friend who is a fantastic writer with a great quirky personality that translates really well into her writing. I’ve been trying for years to convince her to start a blog but she’s been reluctant to for a number of reasons.

But one of the main reasons she hasn’t started yet reason was fear. And, I think the best way to diminish the fear of blogging is to demistify what blogging is.

What is a blog?

So, what is a blog?
Let’s look at the definition of blogging to get us started:

”Blog” is an abbreviated version of “weblog,” which is a term used to describe web sites that maintain an ongoing chronicle of information. A blog features diary-type commentary and links to articles on other Web sites, usually presented as a list of entries in reverse chronological order. Blogs range from the personal to the political, and can focus on one narrow subject or a whole range of subjects

Introduction to Blogging

A blog (a truncation of the expression web log)[1] is a discussion or informational site published on the World Wide Web and consisting of discrete entries (“posts”) typically displayed in reverse chronological order (the most recent post appears first). Until 2009 blogs were usually the work of a single individual, occasionally of a small group, and often covered a single subject. More recently “multi-author blogs” (MABs) have developed, with posts written by large numbers of authors and professionally edited. MABs from newspapers, other media outlets, universities, think tanks, advocacy groups and similar institutions account for an increasing quantity of blog traffic. The rise of Twitter and other “microblogging” systems helps integrate MABs and single-author blogs into societal newstreams. Blog can also be used as a verb, meaning to maintain or add content to a blog.

Definition of Blog via wikipedia

Whew. Confused yet?

On the other hand, I have a simple definition of a blog and blogging.
Are you ready? Here it comes and its a doozy.

Blogging is writing, and a blog is a platform for your words.

Let’s try it again:

Blogging is writing, and a blog is a platform for your words.
A blog can be about a lot of things, or it can only be about one thing.
It can be as multifaceted or specific as the writer wants it to be.
Starting a blog is also tied to why people (you) like to write:

Because you have something to say.

Because you feel like you have something of value to share.

Because its an outlet for you, a way to express yourself.

But in the grand scheme of things, you don’t need a big reason.

I started blogging because I like to write, and because I follow a lot of people who blog, and I want to follow in their footsteps.
And, honestly, I ‘ve never known a time when I didn’t want to write.

So now that you know what a blog is, let me turn the question around, why do you want to blog?