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what is it about bloggers imploding? is this the next phenomena? is this the price of a successful personal site? am I next?
The Web diary has perhaps seen its day, but I don't see weblogs going anywhere.
But in many ways to me it is the the web diary that is more interesting. Maybe I am just a closet voyeur, but I do feel the narrative in the average web diary is far more engaging (intellectually, emotionally, whatever...) than what I find in the vast majority of blogs. I think it is that engaging narrative that is missing from too many web sites: personal, professional and corporate. I am not talking soap opera here, but I want to be engaged...challenged, even provoked.
is your delicate introspective nature getting a wee bit wilted from too much spotlight?
the discussion below is pretty intersting... what differenciates a weblog from a web diary? Should they be two different things?
"should" is a strange word to apply to a free medium. (and i'm speaking about blogs and diaries and other pieces of the personal web here.)
Blog and diary can probably be seen as end points on a continuum. Some blogs are lists of links, with pithy (or not) brief (or not) comments that may or may not provide a reflected impression of the person maintaining it (NCSA What's New as the archetype here). Narrative is optional, usually implied or inferred. Diaries' whole purpose is to provide a direct impression of the person maintaining it. Narrative is essential and explicit. Many (most?) blogaries fall somewhere in between these two extremes, providing the occasional extended personal entry rather than just the nifty link, with some kind of narrative, but not necessarily advanced in every entry. The degree of explicit exposition of narrative seems a decent candidate for figuring out where on this continuum a give site fits.
if you think about it, there's nothing like a strong stance to spur debate. I think Jakob has built a whole career on it.
Most of the sites I visit are somewhere in between as Ralph mentioned, but all of the ones that I am regular to have personnal narrative. Maybe not every entry, but often enough to engage me. None of this may be in any way revolutionary, but it does reinforce for me the value of connected narrative.
while data is useful, it's the humans that make it interesting.
And thereby, they are tales of a persona which presents portions of a person.
I think mike's fake journal was a really interesting experiment in identity. and it was f*cking funny.
Good online conversation is an excellent goal. I too really enjoyed the response to Kottke's recent piece. I have often seen slashdot.org listed as a "blog", but I have always considered it as more of a news and community site. (The problem of labels ?) I miss the days when it was easy to have a good conversation on /. with many opinions and points of view heard. Unfortunately now there are far too many wars, "first posts" and such to really have a good conversation. It got almost too popular. Some of the logs that I regularly visit (personal and professional sites) are providing for those dialogs more and more, although more focused to the blog sites topic and to the initial posting of the author. I think this is an excellent development and would encourage it for a site like this one. With the smaller more focused community of visitors, many of whom will only lurk, the signal-to-noise ratio stays excellent. (I hope)