root/trunk/ProjectFortress/demos/blogs100.out

 I can't help myself. I have to keep this discussion about blogging
 going.  Is blogging just the end result of someone's input into a
 Content Management System. Of course it is. So what. You could point a
 URL to a daily post in a discussion forum. It would have far better
 interactivity than a blog, and would be just as easy to post as often
 as the author would like. Does that make the output purely a forum post
 ? Or for those old school among us, putting up a page on a website
 could be a blog, a column, a report, whatever. The manner of how you
 post something to the web is not even worth discussing. A blog is a
 blog is a blog.  If you blog, regardless of what software you use, you
 are a blogger and what you produce is a blog. If you want to call
 yourself a columnist, so be it. If you are a reporter in a 1 page
 internet only publication, yes you are.  From there, only one question
 comes up. Why. Why ? Why do you do what you do. Is it because: You get
 paid to do it ?  Because you want to promote something or to promote
 yourself ?  Because you want to start a discussion ?  Because you want
 to communicate with customers, fans or ??  Because its a way to say
 whats on your mind ?  Because you want to make money from it ?  I'm
 sure there are other reasons to communicate on the web. What software
 you use, even whether you use video, text and/or pictures, really
 doesn't matter.  What matters is why you do what you do.  For most of
 us, we start on the furthest reaches of the long tail of all content.
 To make money from whatever it is we produce is not only difficult, its
 near impossible. To get off the long tail is near impossible as well.
 Only a few will ever find their way to a point of generating enough
 consumers of our content to have any choice in whether we monetize or
 influence a material number of people. Others of us will still be in
 the long tail, but have influence in a small verticial segment
 important only to those who already know us, or come to know us. Its
 possible to be a big player in a small pool, and get paid for it,
 still reside on the long tail.  The hope by all on the longtail is that
 the "quality" of the publication will garner enough consumers to move
 them off.  Like the artist whose art is better, the band or musician
 whose music is better, the producer, director or actor whose video is
 better. Everyone hopes that quality of content is the final arbiter of
 attraction and success.  The worst part of it all is that when you are
 on the long tail, it takes a lot of money or luck to get off and
 99.99pct , never get off. Which is exactly the definition of the
 longtail.  Thats for individuals.  For corporations who publish on the
 web (as opposed to aggregate 3rd party content), again, regardless of
 what content management software they use, or what they call
 themselves, the longtail is death.  If you are a blogger, and you work
 for a major media company, you are born with a silver spoon in your
 mouth. You are granted a platform with traffic. Thats the good news.
 The bad news is that you also have ratings. If you can't hold your
 traffic or build upon it, you better hope you generate sufficient value
 in other places, or your days of publishing on the web may be numbered.
 For those of you who haven't noticed, paid bloggers do come and go from
 media websites if they don't produce. But wait, there is worse news.
 The media companies that have traffic foundations and can dual purpose
 people so that they can publish off line and online come with their own
 set of problems. They are paddling as fast as they can to retain their
 offline businesses. Newspapers, to continue to use them as an example,
 are pushing as hard as they can to sell papers and retain advertisers.
 For those who think that a newspaper is just like a newsletter, you
 have never been a paperboy.  To try to maximize online traffic and
 resultant revenue, newspapers turned to blogging. Saul Hansell of the
 NYTimes commented that blogs are used uniquely and thoughtfully by
 NYTimes reporters to communicate new information and create discussion.
 That's great.  It's a way for the paper to drive readers to their
 website, keep them as readers and hopefully add more readers. It's
 using whatever content management system they use to give more value to
 readers. Wonderful.  Unfortunately for them, they are now in the same
 old grind that they are in with the newspaper business. Their articles,
 I mean blogs, vs everyone elses' blogs. They hope that readers believe
 that their content is better and that brings them back. They hope like
 the new TV show following the hit, that they can retain audience.   An
 approach which puts them on the exact same content treadmill   as even
 the smallest blogger. . For some on the NYTimes website, as with any
 and every other newspaper website, they will manage to stand out from
 the crowd. The majority will not. They will bump their way down to
 where everyone else is. Such is the nature of the content business. No
 matter what anyone at the NY Times thinks.
  That is the endgame I see for newspapers that publish complimentary
  content on their website. You can call it blogging. You can even call
  it something else. The point I didnt make clear enough in my previous
  post, is that it has to be something else.  No matter the quality of
  the writer, its just another stab at an audience in a medium where
  there are no barriers to entry. Its just one more example of the
  newspaper business following everyone else onto the web and doing
  exactly what everyone else is doing, but expecting they will be better
  because they are "The big paper".  Thats a huge mistake.
 Call me crazy, as many out there have, but I would have made every
 effort to be different in a way that leverages brains, technology and
 size. I would have sat down and tried to figure out the answer to the
 question "What leverages our strengths and pre empts every blogger out
 there so that people perceive blogging as the low end and our
 presentation as the future of the medium" You wouldn't have to get it
 right out of the gate, but you could send a message that you are
 striving for more and those with "merely a content management system
 for blogs" will not be able to do what you do.  This is the bias that
 comes from 25 years in the technology business. A feature that anyone
 can add is not a sustainable differentiation. Since you can easily add
 it anytime, like everyone else, instead, always look for what can set
 you apart and pre empt the competition Or you can following the pack.
 The longtail is there waiting for those who do Permalink | Email
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There was a lot of discussion about my previous posts here and here. My
point is that the internet is a stable platform. Its a utility. Its
evolved to the point where you can count on it and develop applications