Social Dynamics of the Web

Blog

November 13, 2004 at 12:30 am | In Uncategorized |

Just saw this post: Many-to-Many: The Tragedy of the Comments

Clay’s essay on the difference between the social dynamics of mailing lists and blogs expresses well something I’ve been trying to say for a while - that blogs work better for discussion than mailing lists, because the blogs are owned.

Clay discusses flame wars rather than spam, but the issues are similar - people taking advantage of others’ resources without recompense. When comments are turned on on blogs, they eventually fill up with flames and spam too, unless they are carefully maintained.

If instead of commenting, you write a response on your blog, you are standing behind your words, and associating them with the rest of your writing. The social dynamics are very different; you think more before responding instead of posting a quick flame. You can’t really spam, as you are only soiling your own garden.

I can’t say I fully understand how a conversation can take place on more than one blog, nor do I understand trackback, but I immediately thought of emailing the link to Phil Cubeta and Michael Herman. They’ve both been talking a lot about how blogging helps friends get visibility and attention by virtue of being linked to friends. This could be because I blog about generosity, giving or philanthropy and link to Gifthub, or because I blog about the kind of world I’m building and what I need to make that happen and link to the Small Change News Network, or whatever it is.

Then I stopped and posted this here instead. Michael just moved to London so he won’t see it right away, but I know he’s subscribed to this blog with bloglines so will catch up eventually. What about Phil? Will he see it? With a few exceptions (Chris, Ashley and Steve), I’m still not sure who’s reading my blog, so I have no idea. Maybe I’ll have to email him the link. :-)

8 Comments

Ted, I check technorati.com every day, and so would see the link from you, even if I had not read your blog that day. Likwise, if you check technorati, you will see my post about this post. Trackbacks when enabled show, on your post itself, what other blogs have linked to your post.

Comment by The Happy Tutor — November 14, 2004 #
I come back and look fairly often, too. We’re interested in similar things, it seems.

Comment by Jon Husband — November 14, 2004 #
Ted, thanks for letting me know that the link in my blog post didn’t work … sloppy html proof-reading on my part. Fixed it.

Comment by Jon Husband — November 14, 2004 #
Jon, great- I’ll follow the link now. :-) Thanks for visiting!

Comment by Ted Ernst — November 14, 2004 #
Hey, ted. Thanks for coming back and thanking me ;-)

As for you comment about learning about blogs and stuff, here’s bit of musing I did on the subject about a month ago - titled “Linky Thinking”

Comment by Jon Husband — November 14, 2004 #
There’s a lot of thanking going on!

Comment by Ted Ernst — November 14, 2004 #
Ted, I read your blog occasionally too. one day, when i need to create a blog, i know where to come. as far as the elements and technology you’ve spewed (i’m reading your blog in reverse order (11/25,11/24,11/23, etc) i’m completely lost, and i’m curious.

it’s a cool feeling.

Comment by Steve — November 26, 2004 #
Glad to see you here again, Steve. I’m in Ghana now, but we should get together when I get back next week. One of my plans for the near future is to write an extensive “how-to” for anyone wanting to start a blog. Maybe you’ll be one of my first readers! :-)

Comment by Ted Ernst — November 26, 2004 #

Sorry, the comment form is closed at this time.

Humanize the Earth!

Evolutionary weaving of the threads of life