Bloggers are opinionated (at least some are) and I’ld rather call them columnists. But then again, journalists are opinionated as well and every newspaper/MSM has his own political touch.

What differentiates a blogger from a journalist? The paycheck? Or the freedom to write an only 2 lines long news entry and not having to write x words to fill up spot y?
Times are changing. Those classical strategies already find their way in blog networks. And soon lobbies will manage laws where bloggers HAVE TO disclose the origin, especial if the blogger makes a nice paper from his website and blogs news (On a side note, why do portals such as computer communities in Germany have to disclose, but bloggers not? If the webmaster doesn’t want to disclose, he has to become member of the (freetime) journalist association)

Blogs still are a hype. Wait a second before you shoot me!
I hate it when I find most (technical) information about upcoming Windows Vista/IE7/Whatevah on a blog and have to really dig my way to find something specific. I much more [sic] prefer the old style portals, especially in that area, yes a genuine CMS with different corners such as technical info, discuss area (forums), tips, problems aso.
What do I have in our times? A blog with some entries. If it is web two’ish, I got an API to retrieve information and if I am lucky a bug tracker and a wiki.
Hallo? Why not first build a CMS with one database. It would make the search function a lot more agreable on mentionned platforms. Later you can provide me with an API.
Yes, they/many use lots of gradients and ajax, two things I actually like, but the usability of many of those blogs/collections of apps has become horrible because now I need to search many platforms before I have found what I wanted. Sometimes I even have to register to browse a bug tracker. WTF?

I think you get what I try to explain. I consider myself a geek, borderline nerd and am involved/member of many technical/IT communities. Many of my online friends blog personally (the diary/diarrhea style), but contribute to many CMS portals/communities.
They don’t give a rat’s [insert here back body part] about a platform being web two’ish, gamma or web fifty seven’ish. They just want it to be simple, usable and contain as much information as possible for their needs. If it looks nice, cool but gradients and ajax are not that important to most users. The corner we/you hang out in (those who doubt about a blog being two’ish) are maybe 1% (OK, I’ll be nice 2%) of the web.
We use buzz words, and even think we understand them. For the main stream user (would this be MSU?), those words have no meaning and the answers to your survey have proven this. And no you nor I were surprised by them. We know it. They just want a working web, nothing else.

But BMW Z5, now that would be a buzz word everyone would understand. Web2.0? Do I have to download software to update the internet?
I see this non-stop at my personal blog. A while I have plugged pretty web two’ish apps. My lurkers are mainly people who also fart twice. Do you think they care about those nice apps?
Do you think they actually know Photobucket is Web2.0 (me love some labelling)? No.
But what they do know is that Photobucket is easier when they want to insert a picture on their blog than flickr. We geeks, we might drool about the technical beauty of flickr but Mike, Marc and Mathilda they really don’t care. Actually do they understand what tags are?

Ok, I’ll finish my web2.0 fart here. But I think you get what I mean.
And as for the language : I blog/comment in my fourth language. I never wanted to be a journalist either, but am still opinionated.
I read blogs, not because of their grammatical correctness [sic] but because of their opinions. ;-)

With blogging, I think it will (or is already) fragmenting. You’ll always have the diary types. Then you’ll have the business types (marketing tools) and finally the blogs as pure businesses … eg. like magazines ;-)

The latter is all about branding and rising above the clutter – there’ll be a handful of successes but many failures – just like in traditional publishing. I’m sure you’re seeing this happening just as I am.

Yeah, you have a point there with the Google alerts – you really see the difference between traditional media and blogs at times.

I don’t want to be seen as no grammar and spelling police but I see so much bad writing (I’m sure I do it as well – it’s called lazy writing). When you’re just doing it for yourself and there’s no editor and paycheck over your shoulder you tend to get lazy.

I prefer to see the majority of blogs as opinionated columnists rather than news outlets – those that do go for the newsy type just have to get more professional and deliver their own content (I’m talking to myself here, I think;)

“disguise the blogginess” – it sounds bad and sad to do that but essentially you’re right. For me, trying to gain a mainstream audience in Australia the term blogging is rarely used. That’s just plain common marketing sense. My research tells me not many Aussies see blogs as “real” media so I gotta go with the flow.

For me, these day, I see blogging software (WordPress) as simply a publishing platform. As you can see on my upcoming site I’m tweaking it more into a traditional CMS with sections and cutting down of the blogging clutter. I’ve still got a ways to go with though. ;-)

More importantly, John – The Ashes: 40 | Love ;-)

Yaro … good to see you around this joint. How’s Canada treating you? I hear it’s cold in that part of the world. ;-)

Yes, I’ve noticed that news.com.au is playing the web2.0 game quite well. Other not as well.

Actually I’ve just spent a pack of hours last weekend collecting just about every Aussie media outlets web presence. It’s a good way to keep an eye on any trends as they deal with mainstream Australia, so any advances on their sites/blogs speaks volumes about where things are heading.

I still think we need the mainstream media to write-up in-depth articles on blogging and web 2.0 issues (especially in the business media) – not just puff pieces which I’m still mainly seeing. Man, I’m still seeing basic how to buy a domain name or set up a brochure website in magazines you’d expect more from.

One of my goals, mate, in ’07 – build some solid relationships with a few selected journo’s and get them in the loop.

However, we know that a majority of people do go online to the big retail sites, like Amazon, and buy stuff. They’ll also use Google to search things out. But 95% will never think of going to a blog for anything, unless it’s a family one or by a friend.

I use Google Alerts a lot and they are very helpful, though a bit slow sometimes. Recently they added Blog Alerts to the Web ones. Comparing the two is depressing for the blogging case. Most of the blog stuff just copies whole from the media or consists of wild speculation and badly written copy. I hardly bother to read it now.

Those of us who use blog software for a commercial purpose, need to disguise the blogginess of what they’re doing and discover new ways to present their material — a lengthy process we’re currently going through.

While mainstream Australia may have no idea what web 2.0 is, the people that should know about are making use of it, which is indication that it will penetrate to the mainstream, assuming it ever does anywhere in the world – i.e. We find a way to make it mainstream consumable…

I try to do the odd post on blogging for our industry and I know some are reading me, but when I do meet some of those folks in person they just don’t seem to grasp the concept or the marketing opportunities (my employer included) it represents, the static web page is what it’s all about for them and they can’t understand the need to have a conversation with their customers. But you already know more about that than I do so I don’t need to go on about it………

My take? While there are a few Aus blogging evangelists, I think they operate in a bubble of sorts, for them it’s all about blogging for bucks and I think that distorts the possibilities and does a disservice to blogging by making it sound like some kind of hype beast, I think this needs to be toned down. Sorry boys but you all sound like snake oil salesmen and folks recoil from that.

I agree with burying that attitude and agree that we need to promote blogging as a highly cost effective (practically free) tool for marketing their product or business.

I think we’re at least a couple of years away from blogging being on the forefront of anything, although the Murdoch press is doing a fine job of educating their readers on the conversation, hopefully a few of those folks commenting will see the potential and go on from there…..

This is my first comment here so I’ll also take the opportunity to say that I always enjoy reading you Martin.

And if, do they care?

As a Belgian living in the UK I won’t comment on The Ashes Day One. Now back to watch paint dry. :P