Signing On and Signing Off--For Now

This stuff is cool. I am an MBA student, and I think I may go into the blogging business my self

This is terrific stuff Stephen. I'm glad to see BW on board with it. Welcome to the World Wide Discussion.

Thanks for the blogging story but I think you give the blogosphere way too much credit.

The world is and has always been full of people who shoot off their mouths about this and that, take pictures and show them to their friends, know something scandalous and "tell!" - and behave in otherwise annoying - or, ok, perhaps, interesting - ways. Some of them are really smart and fun to know. Some of them are nuts. We have known these people all our lives in school, at work, at church...they’re everywhere and always have been. And now they’re on the Internet. So? They’re no more significant on the Internet than they were shooting their mouths off in a bar. They’ve just got a bigger bar to annoy now. And larger numbers of people are going to NOT pay any attention to them.

Bloggers are all suspect. WHY do they shoot off their mouths as they do? WHY should anyone believe what any of them have to say? BusinessWeek has a business plan: We know why you exist. Why do the bloggers exist? Nobody knows: That’s what makes them suspect.

When I want reliable information on anything — politics, technology, cars, religion, whatever — I am going to turn to the big mainstream media names, as usual, because there is a whole big structure in place that absolutely ensures you big guys will at least try to be honest: Your success depends on it.

If you’re biased, if you habitually lie, this is revealed quickly (or eventually), because you are a big locus of attention. This is the best assurance we readers have that you, McGraw-Hill, are credible: Everyone is watching you. If you were like Fox or the New York Times or some other such biased outfit, super-bad accusations would be hurled at you, as they are at Fox and the New York Times, and everyone would be on alert about your questionable objectivity or accuracy. Nobody says super-bad things about Business Week because BusinessWeek does not deserve any such bad reviews. I like that. A lot. It makes a huge huge huge huge difference. And pretty soon people are going to realize that and develop a more accurate conceptual framework of what the blogosphere really is: Totally Suspect, every single one of all nine-million of them is totally, totally suspect.
Nom, NY

I read your blogging article and found it most interesting. I am reading this from Australia and while it seems that Blogs have really taken off with US corporations, it appears to be something that is yet to happen here, at least from what I can gather.

A few questions? Are there many companies providing services around blogs, such as collecting and presenting the data in blogs to large companies? Also I know blogs can drive hits to websites but are they the kind of hits you want? Visit my site if you like! www.silverstream.biz

Great read and loved the style of your article. As a product manager, this is a medium I've just started exploring as a means to gather feadback on concepts we're researching. The first thing need to fine tune is driving traffic. Typos welcome!

You can visit and contribute to my blog at:

http://employstories.blogspot.com

Cheers,

MG

I'd like to commend you on this excellent article. Although I'm a frequent user of the internet, Blogging is something new to me. Your article has been most informative.

I was so impressed by it that I decided to subscribe on-line to your magazine. However, it took me 3 tries before I found the right webpage to do so.

I live outside the US/Canada, and the hyperlink to the appropriate subscription page was so tiny that I missed it. Twice.

May I suggest that you increase the font size of that link so that it is just as big as the words on the rest of that page.

are you talking about heroin?

Excellent article and one that I will certainly cite to clients. I am currently talking to a number of companies in the UK that are looking for assistance to take their first steps into blogging. At the moment it still isn't as big in the UK as it is in the USA, but it is inevitable that it will continue to grow and companies that are early adopters will steal a march on their competitors.

I got here via the Micro Persuasion's RSS feed, looks like I'm the first to comment on your new site. Good luck, welcome and tread gently.

Interesting feature on blogging, you hit a lot of nails on heads and hopefully your readers will begin to understand how this all works, how they really need to start understanding it.

One thing to note, IMO, the blog format i.e. date order thing really doesn't work in a magazine. Although it does illustrate how old old media looks. Your rundown of the editorial process too sounds archaic when compared to blogs. Anyone from old media reading that and seeing the growth in bloggers numbers surely has to ask, how the hell can we compete?

stephen and heather. I used a marker to mark the most important things i want to remember in your article. at no avail. the page is covered all over. Well done. can you imagine that I read the end of your article at friday 11. a.m.
This is magic. there is only one thing. this article is dangerous for you. you will lose your job, you will have to work in advertising as I do. your job will be done by advertising guys in their spare time.

Please have a look at my blog site: www.newdiversity.ch. We want to be diversity bloogers.

well done.

Stephen -- Great article. Or is it a news story? Or "just" a blog?
I've been in news biz for quarter of a century. Began with writing stories with typewriter and paper.
I left MLM (10th largest newspaper in country, I believe)and started RealtyNewsReport.com about a year ago. I am surely not bringing in the kind of revenues like the guy from San Jose paper. Getting some hits, though. Take Care, Ralph

Talk about a set of articles that opened up my eyes!I run a statewide real estate trade association.......17,000 members.......think of what blogging will do to my world.

Informative article. Learned a lot about BLOGS, but as a very busy business person, it was way too long. I don't see blogs as competing with "old media", but complementing it. There are still those of us out here to LIKE to read a REAL magazine because we don't have to wade through other folks' opinions to get at what we're interested in reading and because the articles (presumably) are written by those who have knowledge about an issue vs. just an opinion about an issue. Nombert is right...there is a credibility with Business Week that blogs can't have...by definition.

Big applause to BW! This is historical!

I am happy to see a magazine that I trusted and they begin to share this "trustability" with their readers worldwide. This type of collective responsibility, I believe, will make our world a better place.

Should setup a wiki, so every thing you guys blog about, there will be volunteer tranlating for you into other languages (I can do Chinese for sure). I think this one is very very important!

BTW, on the homepage, you guys forget to add the page title...

Once again, good job and thanks!

As an online marketing and advertising expert with over 25 television and cable networks as my clients, I can't afford NOT to become an expert about blogs and learn how to utilize their enormous influence for my clients' benefit.

Please feel free to contact me if you have the blogging expertise and creativity that I can put to work for my clients.

A suggestion: the font color you've chosen for links is very hard to see. I couldn't tell they actually 'were' links until I accidentally moused over them.

First of all - great article. I'm a first time "blogger" and current MBA student at the University of Texas. I think you are right that blogging will definitely serve business and possible create an outlet for advertisers as well. My primary concern is that marketers will begin to use blogs as a way to stealthly infiltrate blogging communities to create "buzz" about their products. As Nombert DePlume said above, it begs the question of who can you trust on these? However, the very fact that Nombert is (and now I am) a part of the blogging "system" says more about the direction of bloggers (and how marketers will target those with similar interest - whether that is selling Prozac to the "nuts" out there or beanie babies to a collection club). Very interesting subject. I do see a place for traditional mass media, but it will be interesting to see in what form it takes on.

Great to see the BW blog. As I have had great problems with delivery of my BW subscription to my non US address, I am glad that I can still stay current with BW through the Internet.

My company deals in Internet telephones and VoIP and our blog was launced in February with news and snippets about VoIP and in particular how it applies to Bermuda.
Our blog is at http://voipbuzz.blogspot.com/

Heather and Stephen-Thankyou!

I travel so much, I can read my BW on planes but that isn't the answer for the current events and business connections helping to change our world for the better.Like a state of grace this blog reality will help bring more accountability with the help of the experienced backboards available at keybourds across the world wide discussion.. What an excellent service you two now offer up your BW readers!

BTW Any Venture Capitalist would be equally impressed at the availability of information in a style easy to relate to, enjoy and use.
You two Green and Baker bring together an interesting bunch and are like a much needed research and development staff at any happening company headquarters.

I also loved your bw artical on blogging which brought me here on your first glorious day .I don't normally have time to read the small urls but yours caught my eye and were on the money.Already I look forward to checking in with your blog daily, even if I haven't the time to post.

I am in the Venture Capital Biz, and the future looks bright for investing in the Blogging arena with anyone competently assembling information ,personal perspectives,leads and experience.This type of consumers due diligence is handy for manufacturing for advertising all the way up to corporate malfeasance...which was always necessary but sorely missing, not to mention a level playing field for the employees who have legit gripes or citizen reporters international attrocities circling around in our world.An investigative reporters job has never been so easy.

And as Nombert DePlume says, truth speaks for itself .People will pay for credibility, so remember , a credible blog is a valuable blog.

My Congratulations of a job well done, and also to your inspiring participants so far.

And fellow bloggers:Congratulation to you all and the experience and idealism you bring to this thrilling venue.

Laurel Weiner

very cool and a great way to shake up business people who sit in their ivory towers wondering what's coming next..only to react and find out years later. and well written, too...

The beauty of the blog is that you have interested parties doing "investigative research" constantly--often turning up info before companies would have it be public knowledge. A specific instance of this investigative reporting highlights some of the risks involved, both for the "reporter" and the company being snooped out. You note how progressive GM has been in the blogosphere, but progress is a gradual thing. When pictures of the new Corvette Z06 came out on the web several weeks before they were supposed to have been published (early Dec '04), GM sent "agents" to warn off the unsuspecting guy that stumbled across them. The guy was a fan, and was thrilled to find some cutting edge info. And he was rewarded with threats of legal action. GM figured out where he lived, and sent poeple to his house. Worse yet, the whole thing was chronicled step by step on several of the GM and Corvette forums I visit, much to GM's embarrasment(digitalcorvettes.com, z06vette.com). Moreover, the guy got expert legal advice from bloggers that already had a great reputation for good advice, and learned that he was in fact fairly immune to the threats leveled at him.

Assume that those of us that witnessed the spectacle will take some slight measure of extra caution should we encounter similar info in the future. Will this hoped-for result be worth the bad press they got for their trouble? It very well may, but GM probably didn't weigh it out that way. You can guarantee they will in the future. The same thing happened to BMW with their new 3 series, and they pretty much ignored it. Sure, they were bugged, but they didn't go around threatening people.

Why go to this trouble if the blogs are nothing more than opinions lacking credibility? Mostly because there is not as large a credibility gap as one might expect. Again, I'm speaking from an automotive point of view, because that is where some of my principle interests lie, but there are a lot of engineers, line workers, and retired employes from all disciplinies on the blogs and forums, and a lot of these people DO have inside info. Info whose reliability is usually rather quickly verified, if not by corroborating posts, then eventually verified by the company in question when the actual events play out. Faster information cycles these days quickly reveal a blog's true colors, and they earn their wings just like BW has done--just a lot faster.

I can't say enough about your article. It has inspired me to start my own blog on business related matters. I may start another one that has to do with my passion of fly fishing.

Great work I learned a lot.

Great article! Interesting view into a medium that is new and intriguing ... looking forward to the follow up.

Excellent article on blogs. I work in a large company and my job focuses on business and employee communications. We're trying to figure out how we can connect better with our customers and our employees. Blogs could be a way.

"Bloggers are all suspect. WHY do they shoot off their mouths as they do? WHY should anyone believe what any of them have to say? ... Why do the bloggers exist?"

Well Nombert, to answer your questions:

1 & 3. Two words: SELF PROMOTION. We shoot off our mouths because it can be lucrative to do so. If we're not earning money from our blogs, then we're earning job opportunities or new business because of them.

2. Because people who blog for career and business (as opposed to keeping an online diary) *do not* want to damage their credibility. Folks in the blogosphere are quick to "fact-check your a**." Being known as a lying you-know-what is just not worth it.

Great article. Found you as I was searching for RSS feeds and new blogs.

We are just in the process of setting up a new blog on our reality TV show site www.bookmillionaire.com .

Wish us luck. I'll be watching BW and this blog for more direction and insight on blogging.

Thanks

Thanks for the very timely article. We are finishing a five year IT plan and will be adding a section regarding the positive uses of Blogs.
Your article was very timely.
Keep up the good work.

Technology should not be so limiting. I am a BW subscriber, yet I won't waste my time registering to your online versions, nor figure out how to set it up automatically, I delete cookies, blah,blah,blah. So I love your insights, and I go online to find the link to "Lockhart Steele". Woooooo - NO WHERE TO BE FOUND?????????? So I search in your box and 5 results come up and I click on them and you prompt me to register UGhhhhhhhh. Guess I'll leave you now!!!!! So where is MSM headed - the web makes "knowledege is power" FREE - read this again - FREE! The ability to be great lies with enabling not disabling - open it up - WIDE!

Interesting article on Blogs. My concern is accuracy of information. It may be a significant issue for Business, but, in my opinion, not for a while.

The cover story was great ... and quite a surprise. I assume it was inspired by -- or at least totally embraced by -- the new editor-in-chief. For 'BW,' this struck me as forward-thinking, smart, and (dare I say it?) hip.

Will be following the blog to see how it develops.

Good luck!

The problem with blogs, is that they are basically opinions of the masses - and as one of the commenters stated - they are all suspect (Nombert DePlume). I agree with that person. Most people just want to hear themselves talk or see their names in "lights," including me, I'll admit. If I could make millions doing this instead of something else, I would. But the key issue is - HOW DO WE KNOW THAT ANYTHING WRITTEN IN BLOGS IS ACCURATE AND TRUE? We assume and hope that MSM info has been authenticated, and obviously the more blogs out there who whistleblow on things like Rather's report, etc, the more accurate subsequent reports we might assume to be. Thanks.

OK, I'm reading the paper version of "Blogs will change your business." So sue me, I'm not with it.

But how can you say, after the Internet debacle, that blogs will change your business, or publish a quote by someone who says "They just don't get it?"

The Internet has, again, simply made access easier. In the same way that eBay didn't invent a new business model but simply centralized the fragmented auction/garage sale world, the Internet is centralizing distribution of content.

Gutenberg's invention of moveable type didn't just empower the few. Broadsides were part of the American Revolution, and many other European movements: Luther's theses were published everywhere. Small circulation special interest newsletters exist in the thousands.

And who says the Internet represents the real world? And who says that 10-second news bites or thought bites are all the value in distribution?

I find this all quite interesting and think we can save a few more trees and even get more people out on bikes.

Just wanted to see if this really works

Many thanks for the introduction to and explanation of the anticipated influence of blogging in the commercial world to come. You've provoked an urge to explore further.
Many thanks

Many thanks for the wonderful blogging article and your notice of the Stonyfield Farm blogs. You are entering wonderful new territory. I wish you the best of luck. (Heather, the learning curve is constant, sorry to say.)

For those who worry about the accuracy of blogs, take note that the print edition of the story in Business Week spelled my name wrong--it's Halvorson, not Halverson--but all is forgiven!

Read your article. It was an eye opener. I thought I would try this out for myself. Thanks for some insight.

The BW story really missed the mark, and fell into the "ythis is cool" trap. Boiled down, it said that blogs mean there are new, unmanaged venues for discussions about products, companies, and issues. Fine. So what?

If anything, blogs should make considered, filtered information more valuable. A blogger and commenters to a blog may have no real credibility, just adding more noise for people to sort through. (Which may be why the percentage of Americans looking at blogs is fairly low, as the story says -- it's like spending time each day to gossip with strangers.) Information from credible sources -- who could be nontraditional journalists, advocacy groups, experts, etc. -- should have more value, while blogs by and large become a rumor mill that most companies should not give credibility to.

Businesses should be wary of blogs as a marketing vehicle as well, since they are unmanaged and could easily become an official conduit for misinformation. And stealth blogs, where companies pay alleged influencers to peddle their wares or services, are simply unethical and should be unmasked, with the corporate backers skewered rightfully for trying to fool the public.

Blogs, like the discussion groups of the 1980s on places like the Well and the Source, can bring farflung constituencies together and provide a vehicle for an unheard voice that has something valuable to share. But those will be the needles in the haystack. The rest is chaff, and in this downsized economy, how much time and money is there really to sift through chaff?

Hi, great article, even I'm in Hong Kong I still feel the power of blogging. While blogs may not replace MSM, at least one thing is certain: if you read this comment, blogs help a great deal.

I think forums are more useful to me than blogs.When I used to read newspapers(I stopped because it took up too much of my time) I felt impelled to read too much until I disciplined myself by imposing a time limitation. I'm just not interested in EVERYTHING. Even though I am retired I am always short of time. I guess Google will help me find what is interesting.I take the mailed copy of BW Magazine and enjoy reading 95% of the content.

Ahh, Chris, many apologies. I'll get that corrected right away. And oh boy, are you right to point it out...I can tell this is going to be a continuous learning curve. Thanks!

My two favorite blogs are lawprofblogs.com and EnPassant.com

...sorry I forgot the url...

Once again...great article.Thanks.

My husband asked me to read your Business Week article and then explain it to him. I believe I can but if I don't remember what URL is I am not sure.

Jois
If you have any questions, we can certainly talk about them here. Hopefully we explained what the different terms mean in a way that does make sense. But let us know if that isn't the case.
Thanks.

I'd been hearing quite a bit about blogging and it's increased popularity and influence but this is the first article I've read that has provided enough information for me to begin to truly grasp it's potential. Thanks for an excellent and enlightening article!

This is my example. On a Yaohoo group self publ;ishing list a member posted the link to the Business Week article on blogging. I don't buy news magazines anymore, I read what I want to read on line. I linked to the article, read it, found it interesting and linked to your new blogging page. Bingo, Here I am! I may never visit again, although I'll Bookmark it for a few days to see if it is worth my time, if I learn anything, if I am intrigued. I am in control of my own information destiny and can know as much or as little as I choose about anything at all, and all without wasting any trees.

Wow this is great news. Any system that can take a sale from ebay and give money back to the users is a great system. Why dose a company like ebay need to have such a high amount of control over its members transactions ?http://www.auction4seller.com

Wow this is great news. Any system that can take a sale from ebay and give money back to the users is a great system. Why dose a company like ebay need to have such a high amount of control over its members transactions ?http://www.auction4seller.com

It's finally happened. In the spirit of wacky ebay auctions that generate media storms there is now an ebay auction touting the techniques that can be used to start a media blitz. Can you imagine what would happen if everyone selling something on the net was able to do that? I don't know if that would be good or bad?
http://www.freewebs.com/getlook
http://www.freewebs.com/infojewelry