Blogging for History

I found an interesting article the other day which stated the Library of Congress has gathered every public "tweet" since Twitter started four years ago. Just some numbers to think about........there are over 100 million active users on Twitter and there are an average of 55 million tweets per day. Matt Raymond, spokesman for the Library of Congress said the Twitter data stored are equivalent to a 1,135 foot tall stack of CD-ROMs. The article also has quotes from social media marketers who fear every tweet becoming historical record might scare away tweeters. Pretty interesting!

"Library of Congress plans to archive Twitter posts"

Easy Access Podcasts

In class this week we discussed how podcasts are growing in popularity, particularly because of their ease, accessibility, and the fact they are free to the user. Podcasts can be viewed on any subject and usually contain a wealth of information. Not everyone is, but for those who are politics junkies, the forums for discussion on American politics seems endless. It is hard to stay up on all the news and happenings in the political arena and politics might not be top on our list of things to read. Politico.com is a site for those who love to follow politics. There are blogs, updates, and releases for those who love to read up on political happenings. I would encourage you to listen in on one of the many podcasts Politico offers to catch-up on whats going on in Washington.

Redirection to YouTube

This past week in class we discussed the concept of "time spent on page," in regards to internet advertising. We noted how it is one thing to generate a lot of hits on your website, but for the purposes of advertising, the important measuring statistic is actual time spent on the page. Our class discussed how recently, we have seen advertisements that have directed the target audience to their Facebook or YouTube page rather than their corporate homepage. This seemed a bit off to us, but we thought perhaps a certain segment of the audience might be more likely to look at information through a third party new new media outlet like Facebook and YouTube rather than the corporate home page. Governor Mitt Romney operates the Free and Strong America PAC. I subscribe to his e-newsletter which is sent out anywhere from every couple of days to once a week. Recently, correspondence has directed the recipient to go to the PAC's YouTube page, which prominently features a YouTube clip of Gov. Romney's closing remarks at CPAC.

Blogging in the new-media landscape is an important tool that anyone can use. Levinson (2009) argued that a unique characteristic of new new media is the freedom to access and participate. Blogging is a great way for individuals or organizations to simply make statements to any number of target audiences. Blogging is unique since events and opinions can be uploaded and shared a the click of a mouse or now, even the click of a button on a cell phone. Unlike older media, new media and blogs allow for minute by minute updates and communication with target audiences on-demand. Unlike other forms of old media, blogging avoids the delays and potential changes and control applied by editors.

Blogging has many other noteworthy functions that contribute to its importance. Unlike old print media, blogs are accessible to anyone in the world with an internet connection, if you choose that amount of accessibility. Feedback and comments to the blog post can also be added from anywhere by anyone. Blogging and responding to posts promotes a type of communication that has never been achieved with such ease, by so many people, in so many places.

The greatest part about blogging is that the technologies and mediums to communicate through are constantly developing and evolving. Now is a great opportunity to ride the momentum of blogs and similar new technologies and benefit intellectually and possibly economically from them.


I am a huge Chicago Cubs baseball fan, and Carrie Muskat is their beat reporter and regularly maintains and updates a Cubs blog.