On Wirearchy
I think Jon has summed up why blogging is important.
I think is it a fair question, maybe cynical, to ask, “Well they said that about the whole web thing didn’t they?” Yeah, they did. The problem was, and still is, that building websites stopped being easy. When I started building sites, when you had to hand code and tables hadn’t been invented yet, you could just create a fast and dirty site and move on. Granted you needed some kind of FTP program to get the files up to your site, but all you needed was Notepad or Simpletext to get the job done.
And the web got a little more sofisticated, so did the tools. Cool. Designing got easier and more people could do it. Websites were simple and templates were fine. Then we started to get fancy, Javascript, DHTML, and so on. End result it got harder and harder for people to make nice looking websites.
Then came blogs. Simple websites, simply done. Most folks use a template supplied with whatever package or service they use. You might tweak the links and add a personal touch or two, but that’s about it. Posting is fast and easy. Mostly through a web-based tool of some sort. You have to worry about coding for the most part. Just write, post, and be done. You could be walking down the street, see something (amazing, shocking, funny, whatever), jump to an Internet Cafe, post to your blog and the world can know.
Simplicity.
Knowledge is power. Blogs and blogging are human conversation on the Web - exchanges of perspective, opinion, knowledge. Blogging is in the medium and long run more educative than not. If blogging gives people a wider and more direct access to a wider range of sources of information, the overall education of people as to what is going on should improve. People connecting, peer-to-peer and circling each other, watching, listening, learning. “They” won’t control it, will they ? How can they, ? Blogging is the ultimate free speech online, isn’t it ? And it’s pretty much self-regulating as a market, isn’t it ? The whole right-left polarization is nowhere more evident than on the Web - the ultimate level playing field for peoples’ attention, minds and links.