Blogging has become a force to reckon with as far as the internet is concerned. Although social networking has definitely drawn a lot of attention in the past few years, blogging has indeed spread like wildfire over the last decade. In 1999, only 23 blogs were recorded to be in existence. By mid-2006, there were about 50 million blogs according to a report by Technorati.
Political Focus
The earliest blogs leaned toward politics, with political candidates being the central theme of discussion. In fact, some of the material that made it into mainstream media was sparked by bloggers. In other cases, blogs would be used to comment directly on the topics that were featured in traditional media.
Independent Blogging
By 2001, informative blogs, with how-to guides and articles on a wide variety of interests, began to crop up. In addition, some of the major blogging platforms developed during this decade, allowing independent internet users to start their own blogs with ease. In the past, a blogger would have to manually 'code' his or her blog, which required a certain level of programming skills.
Blogging for Profit
It was also at this point that people realized the potential that blogging held as a marketing tool. AdSense, an online advertising platform, was launched in 2003. It was a network that allowed users to match advertisements to a blog's content. This in turn opened up opportunities for bloggers to make money from their blogs. However, this was only profitable for blogs with high traffic.
Media
Mainstream media sites also began to venture into blogging as a means to provide additional commentary and coverage on their stories. Blogs became an ideal opportunity to broadcast opinions and interact with the audience. Today, almost all news sources have at least one blog, and the same applies to most corporations.
Social Networking
Blogging has also spread its wings to include social networking features. For instance, microblogging, which includes features of both traditional blogging and social networking, has become very popular today, with sites like Twitter, Tumblr and Posterous making this possible. In contrast to traditional blogging which provided a one-size-fits-all format, microblogging allows users to include multimedia objects to their blogs while the format is dependent on the individual's preference. In fact, there are blogs that only feature multimedia content like videos (vlogs).
Blogs for Business
Blogs have also become a very effective marketing tool for small and large businesses alike. They give you the opportunity to build your reputation as an expert in your field. In addition, a blog presents you with the opportunity of driving additional traffic to your website(s) . The interactive nature of blogs also makes it possible for you to interact with your audience, which is a very effective way of turning potential clients into returning customers.
The Future
Blogs have indeed become an integral part of the internet and they are unlikely to lose their popularity in the coming years. However, there is also a lot of room for improvement, and if the history of blogs is anything to go by, you can expect a lot of innovations in the near future as well.