Blogs: Critical Mass?
on 11.03.04, 02:46pm in weblog • comments (4)
I remember the exact moment (many years ago, probably in 95) when I realized that the web was about to hit critical mass, and this thing called the “world wide web” wasn’t going to be only a geek thing for very long: I was standing in my kitchen, and saw that Reynolds Wrap Aluminum Foil had a web site address. At that very moment, I just knew.
While I’ve been writing a weblog for several years now, not many people outside of the geek world really understood what I (and so many other geeks) are writing about every day on our websites. Then last night I had the same eerie sense of deja’ vu: I was watching election coverage (on NBC) and the reporter said that one reason she believes that so many young people were voting was due to “blogs” and the ability it’s given so many people for self-expression.
Interesting. While my wife thinks the reporter was crazy, it doesn’t really matter if the reasoning was right or wrong - blogging has begun to hit critical mass.
Randy (November 3, 2004 @ 5:29 pm)
I agree that blogging is hitting critical mass - there’s enough Geeks out there that talk to non-Geeks about them, which makes them aware… and the topics seem to be becoming less Geekish in nature.
However, I’m inclined to think that young people were voting b/c the media told them to, MTV included. I’d like to see the numbers of 18-22 yo’s that voted this year versus the number in 2000. I’m sure it’s the same rate of new voter in the turn out, which would imply that the older media of TV had the same impacts - blogs were hard to come by in ‘00.
Beau (November 3, 2004 @ 7:58 pm)
Sorry Steve, I gotta side with Liz on this one. So many young people weren’t voting at all, the numbers being roughly the same as they were in 2000, per capita. I’m actually very surprised that the 18-24 voters didn’t turn up in higher numbers, especially after all MTV and their kind did to scare the bejesus out of them with the draft meme.
Steve (November 3, 2004 @ 10:47 pm)
Im not saying the reporter was right or wrong, rather I’m saying that the news media mentioning blogging is important.
KC Lemson (November 4, 2004 @ 5:44 am)
I had a conversation last night with a very non-geek friend of mine… I told her that I read about what she did for her husband’s birthday on his blog, and she said he has a BLOG?. I was really impressed that she knew what it was.