Well this was meant to be my opening post on the blog. Since from the time I was introduced to the term “blog” by one of my good friends, I have always yearned to find out more about blogging & related things like its origin etc. My subsequent wandering so as to fulfill this endeavor of mine unexpectedly reached its destination when I came across an article on “Amateur Publishing” in Science Reporter July edition. And now I could not resist myself from sharing its excerpts with everyone. So here goes my blog on blog itself…

The word ‘blog’, shortened from ‘weblog’, may sound alien to many. In common speech, the term blog is often used to describe an online diary or journal. And as you all know authoring a blog, maintaining a blog or adding an article to an existing blog is called blogging & of course a person who posts entries is called a blogger.

On 17 December 1997, Jorn Barger coined the term “weblog” to describe the process of “logging the web” as he surfed. The short form, “blog”, has now been accepted as a noun(weblog shortened) and as a verb. Almost 9 years hence, these online diaries are becoming a part of the daily lives of many teenagers & college students like all of us.

So the question arises is why blog is so much growing in popularity?

Well there could be no joy greater than that of seeing one’s writing in print. The feeling of euphoria & immense satisfaction that engulfs oneself knowing that yours article is being read by many is absolutely awesome. But since traditional publishing entails high cost as well as the huge risk of being rejected by the editor, so it becomes a sort of barrier to the entry of amateur & first-time writers. So the easier & better way out is undoubtedly publishing on the net as it does not involve heavy investments and there is a much wider readership that may be interested in your opinions or imaginations.

The appeal of this form of communication is that the recipient can read whenever it is convenient, and the writer does not need to remember who still needs to be updated with certain pieces of information- it is there, waiting, for whenever people wish to read it! Blog allows for easy filtering of content for various presentations: by date, category, author or other attributes. A blog need not always be operated by a sole individual, there are community blogs too, in which a group of people contribute, responding to each other’s ideas, as well as remaining in view to the other interested readers.

The blogs are good indicators of the writing skills of a person. In addition, there are infact publishers that are looking out for fresh talent on the internet, so if your posts interest them, they may approach you. So, in a blog publishing becomes as effortless as the straight drive coming from sachin’s blade or the riveting backhand of federer or a beckham free kick.
Since you don’t have to seek permission from anyone to write. Neither do you need to convince skeptical publishers of the viability of your writing!

Now the flipside of a blog vs a website. Your blog is at the mercy of the organization/proprietor of the blogsite. If tomorrow he/she decides to close shop, or starts putting some advertisements along with your posts, you cannot ask for any compensation for the work you have posted on the site. Quite fair, isn’t it?? After all you are not charged any money for the facility.

So this was a sort of summary of the article written by Rakesh mohan hallen with some appropriate inputs from my side.
I hope this serves to quench all the queries you might have about blogging. As we all know that to excel in any field in life its very important to know its very roots, the basics. So now friends as Sherlock holmes once famously quoted: “I always know what ever there is to know”, I hope you also have a firm footing about the what’s & why’s of blogging.

For those who have not yet started with this amazingly addicted thing called blogging (I am one of the addicts myself!), I seriously recommend to you all log on to a blogsite create an account & start blogging. And to all those who blog regularly keep up the good work buddies. For after sometime(maybe even after reading this post) , you all may start singing the Enrique Iglesias super song: “May be I am addicted…”!!!

Welcome to the world of blogging and you are all invited…