Blog

A blog, short for weblog, is a website in which a person shares his or her personal thoughts, opinions, activities, and experiences. It is an online version of a personal diary or journal. People called bloggers typically blog, or share posts, about whatever interests them. Some people blog about their personal lives, jobs, and families, while others blog about a particular topic or subject of interest such as food, politics, home decorating, health and fitness, sports, or pets. People blog for a variety of reasons such as to share their lives, educate others, and make money. In addition, blogs allow writers to interact with readers, known as followers, by letting them leave comments about blog posts. Additionally, bloggers can connect their blog to their social media accounts to extend their reach. Some major publications such as the New York Times host blogs on an array of topics.

History of Blogging

Blogging did not become mainstreamed until the 1990s. Swarthmore College student Justin Hall is crediting with creating the first blog, Links.net, in August 1994. At this time, however, the term blog was not yet used. Hall used his personal home page as an online diary. At the end of 1997, Jorn Barger of the blog Robot Wisdom coined the term weblog, which was later shortened to blog. Several blog-hosting platforms such as Open Diary and LiveJournal appeared at the end of the 1990s. A blog-hosting platform is a service that hosts a blog. One of the most recognizable of these during this time was Blogger, which debuted in August 1999. Blogger would go on to become one of the most popular blog platforms. In 2003, it was purchased by Google. LiveJournal, however, was eventually sold to a Russian media group, SUP Media, in 2007 and lost popularity due to the nation's content restrictions.

At the start of the new millennium, only about two dozen blogs existed. More blog-hosting sites such as Xanga, Movable Type, and WordPress were introduced in the early 2000s. WordPress would become popular like Blogger. Advertising on blogs became common by the mid-2000s, and bloggers had advertisements placed on their blogs so they could generate revenue. The ads made the blogger money when people clicked on them or if a set number of people viewed the ads. Some of these early blog ad companies included BlogAds and Google AdSense.

By the mid-2000s, the number of blogs soared into the millions, according to web advertising company Technorati. Several popular blogs during this time included the celebrity gossip blog Gawker and news blog the Huffington Post. Political news, current events, and celebrity gossip became favored topics of numerous high-profile blogs.

By the 2020s, blogging continued to advance at a rapid rate, with the number of blogs at more than six hundred million, with platform Tumblr hosting the majority of those blogs. In addition, more and more publications such as the Wall Street Journal, Time, and USA Today began adding blogs about a variety of interests to their news sites.

Starting a Blog

One of the first steps to starting a blog is deciding whether to pay for a self-hosted blog or use a free blog-hosting platform. Bloggers have more control over the design of a self-hosted blog, which is a blog hosted by a third-party company such as HostGator or Bluehost. However, there are costs involved with a self-hosted blog. A blog through a free blog-hosting platform does not cost anything and is easy to use for people who do not have website design knowledge. Prior to the 1990s, bloggers needed to know Hypertext Markup Language (HTML), computer language that allows a user to create websites. However, people no longer need to understand or know HTML because of the many free blog-hosting platforms available. These offer bloggers a template that is easy to update, maintain, and edit. The following are some common free blog-hosting platforms:

Blogger (http://www.blogger.com)

Squarespace (http://www.squarespace.com)

Tumblr (https://www.tumblr.com)

Typepad (http://www.typepad.com)

WordPress (https://wordpress.com)

Wix (https://www.wix.com/)

Bloggers should decide what options are most important to them when choosing what type of blog-hosting service to use.

After bloggers have chosen who will host their blog, they need to determine the purpose of their blog. A blog can serve as a personal diary with posts of day-to-day events. It can serve as a place to post information and tips about a hobby such as gardening, cooking, or exercising. Blogs also can educate readers with information about investments, politics, and current events.

Next, bloggers will choose a name for their blog. Names can be simple or quirky and have nothing to do with the content or theme of the blog. The name is up to the blogger, but bloggers should avoid using trademarked names or names already in use. For example, a person named Cathy who starts a cooking blog might name her blog Cathy's Cooking Creations.

Once the purpose and name are decided, it is time to choose the theme, or design, for the blog. Both self-hosted and free blogs offer many different themes. Self-hosted blogs offer bloggers more freedom with design, while free blog-hosting platforms typically offer a set number of free themes. The theme typically includes a background design, different fonts and colors for the title and text on the blog, and the setup of blog posts, including where to place items on the blog such as the title or logo, posts, footers, sidebars, etc.

The last part of setting up the blog is developing content. Now that the blog is set up and designed, bloggers should begin sharing blog posts and communicating with followers. Bloggers should also work to connect their blog to their various social media accounts in order to build viewership and expand their reach. Bloggers should focus on using original content and avoid plagiarizing other people's work or using copyrighted material.

Bibliography

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Knapp Jessica. "How to Start a Blog—Beginner's Guide for 2016." Blogging Basics 101, Nov. 2024, www.bloggingbasics101.com/how-do-i-start-a-blog/. Accessed 18 Dec. 2024.

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Thompson, Clive. "The Early Years." New York, 10 Feb. 2006, nymag.com/news/media/15971/. Accessed 18 Dec. 2024.

"What Is a 'Blog'?" WordPress, 24 Aug. 2023, codex.wordpress.org/Introduction‗to‗Blogging. Accessed 18 Dec. 2024.

Williams, Geoff. "Can You Make Real Money Blogging?" U.S. News & World Report, 23 Sept. 2019, money.usnews.com/money/personal-finance/articles/2013/07/11/can-you-make-real-money-blogging. Accessed 18 Dec. 2024.