History of blogging

Bloggers have been around long before there was a name for it. As long
as the internet has been around, people have been online, sharing their
personal expression. Over time, a commonly accepted form begins to
develop and new people start to adopt this form because it makes
the most sense.

These people who leave online accounts of what they do in the day are
called �web loggers� and their online diaries are called �web logs.�
Early on, those web loggers simply talked about what they did during
the day, which meant that only the people who had time to spend online
would create a web log: mainly teenagers and techies. Their early web
logs might look like this:

Went to school today. English class was not very fun. Math class seemed
to go by quickly. Talked to my friends. Came home.

It wasn�t very exciting but their small group of friends might read each
other�s web logs.

After a while, the words got shortened from �web loggers� and �web logs�
to �bloggers� and �blog.�

Moreover, there was a subtle shift in blogs as well. They started to enter the
mainstream. People started blogging about their day, about the news, about things
they felt and did. If something happened in the news that struck them as funny, they�d
link to it. If they took a picture of their family, they�d post it on the blog. More and
more, people started blogging simply because it was gaining popularity and it was a way to share insight about themselves and say the things that they didn�t always get to say.

Today, there are millions of blogs. Many bloggers still use blogs to talk about personal
news, stories, insight, reactions to events, and to share their opinion. But there are
other reasons to blog as well.

If you have something to say, a blog gives you a place to say it. Below, I have listed a
number of types of blogs that you�ll find online if you look around.

*   Talk about what you do in the day, just like you might record in your personal diary.
*   Look at current events and interpret them from your perspective.
*   Look at your industry or area of specialization and talk about it.
*   If you like to do poetry or creative writing, this is a good place to share your thoughts
with the world.
*   Use a blog among several people to keep track of progress on a work project.
*   You can even use a blog as a place to inform the public and sell your products!

Sometimes, you may find a blog does more than one thing, other times you might find that a blog has just one purpose. The more successful ones seem to only have one reason for being there: Perhaps the person wants to talk about current events and interpret them from their own perspective. If you try to do that, along with selling your products, along with submitting your creative writing, you might find that the mixed messages will keep people away from your blog.

Because blogs are updated frequently, people link to them and read them often. You blog, if it has one purpose, will find an audience interested in what you have to say and they�ll keep coming back for more, as long as your blog is relevant to them.

Blogs are changing the face of the internet by allowing people to link and share personal opinion to the world. There are many opportunities for budding bloggers like yourself. In the rest of this course we�ll show you how to start and maintain your blog and even how to make money with it