I think that's what caused Dee Rambeau to desert the medium (save for monitoring and the occasional participatory comment on a third-party blog). Noise for the sake of cutting edge noise.

That said, I think that there are some very successful blogs, done right, used for the right purposes (Fast Lane comes to mind).

The blog medium serves to open dialogue, no matter what direction that dialogue takes. If your interest is opening up a channel from which a company or organization might benefit from the collective creativity or critique of the masses, or perhaps to get a finger on the pulse of what matters to the masses, the blog might serve. If it's a platform you want from which to preach to the masses your position or the qualities of a product, service or candidate, look elsewhere.

Seems to me, Weil's was a disengenuous misuse of the platform. For most however, it's a geniunely ignorant misuse by people and organizations still with the "preach from the mountains/control the conversation" mindset.

michael clendenin

Oh, I'm not discounting the beauty of blogs, Michael, and I think you raise a good point about organizations blogging who are not fully aware of what the medium works for and what it doesn't.

(Lots of corporate executives think "dialogue" begins with "I think" and ends with "you're brilliant.")

It's just that I thought by this point in the evolution of the blogosphere, veteran bloggers would be less obsessed by the medium itself and wholly focused on the subject matter they're blogging about. It's still the other way around.

As a veteran blogger of 6 months, I think I get why the topic of "blogging" is still big with bloggers. I probably fall into Michael Clendenin's "preach to the masses" category, except that I've never wanted to control the conversation--I just wanted to START conversations on important topics, between thoughtful people, and see what happened.

In my blog, I:
-- Do all the technological things I read about that will help attract search engines (at least, I do all the things I can manage without paying someone to help me)
-- Let content rule, so although I'm more than willing to do the tech stuff I'm NOT willing to keyword-stuff or stick "X WAYS TO" into every post title
-- Have a topic that seems pertinent, at least to me (the tsunami of bullshit and outright lies we're forced to struggle through each day)
-- Work hard to stay on topic and bring up topics that ought to, in a reasonable world (or maybe that's just me), generate conversation

Still, my readership is miniscule. Yes, yes, I know, I'm competing against 70 million (oh, wait: that was yesterday: today it's 80 million) bloggers. I'm not whining; I'm just saying that I'm fairly bright, a good writer, and eager to engage in strenuous conversation when it has a point, and I'm still basically talking to myself. I have yet to figure out how the blogging game is played.

So, yes, blogging and bloggers are still topics of fascination to me.

Well, Jane, that's definitely legit, I'd say. I guess it's still a super-dynamic world, this blogosphere, and its attempts at rule-making and general behavior management is inherently interesting.

But I've been watching this intently (and participating in it, on and off) for three solid years (as have most of the opinionated bloggers who weighed in on the Weil thing) and, though I have no more answers than you do for how to generate traffic, I do wish these fantastic explosions of posts would occasionally happen over issues that I could actually explain to my school teacher wife without having her say with her words or with her facial expression, "My God, what is the matter with you people?"

Of course she's right, David.

Yes, bloggers--in general, not the good ones--are fanatically self-referential, and nothing that happens off the blog grid matters. It's icky. So we have 80 million bloggers, and .5 percent of them, maybe, are serious about using their blog in the very best, strongest way--and they still feel like voices crying out in the wilderness. That can make folks fixated.

To me, the way bloggers can focus on blogging rather than on real issues is exactly the same as the way communicators on MyRagan.com can tend to focus on their frustrations. It's easy to get lost in it, and understandable. Then once in a while a Patrick Williams or somebody throws in a bona fide suggestion or fresh helpful point of view and things start moving in the right direction.

What will change either group? New ways of communicating, new ways of differentiating yourself, new ways of teaming up, new understanding about why people do what they do, and new thinking about what's valuable in life. I say we start here on Shades of Gray!

Ahhhh, Jane, you discount yourself too easily. You say that you probably fall into the "preach to the masses" category but then you qualify it exactly as you should be saying (and I take you at your word) "that I've never wanted to control the conversation--I just wanted to START conversations on important topics, between thoughtful people, and see what happened."

I applaud you for that disclaimer that makes all the difference. Of course we want to use our channel (blog or whatever) to communicate our message, but the blog platform is all about allowing -- nay, desiring -- alternative opinions, perspectives, comment, etc. So we START the conversation, but the conversation has to indeed happen and be accepted. And that is where many fail. They're just speaking to hear their own voices. Just try disagreeing with them!