July 27, 2004
Beauty and the Blog
My beautiful and brainy girlfriend told me about an article in yesterday's Star-Telegram on the popularity of blogging in the Metroplex. It features Byron of the Burnt Orange Report (who lives in Austin, but is listed with us at DFWBlogs.com), the Zany Sports Lady, and a couple of other bloggers that I haven't read before. It doesn't really say anything new, but it is another tear in the veil of blogging anonymity. If a rag like the Startlegram has actually gotten on board, I wonder who's next? The Lubbock Avalance-Journal? The Alvord Sunset Gazette? The Stonewall County Courier?
Way to go Startlegram! Only 1 year late to the story! It'd be interesting to see a timeline of newspaper stories on blogs. You could probably write a form that would generate 90% of those stories.
Man, who wrote this article? A high schooler? Exhibit A:
Blog, as defined by the Oxford English Dictionary (which added the word last year), is short for Web log. It is essentially a public journal, usually put up by amateurs and updated regularly.
Shouldn't the phrase "as defined by [random dictionary]" have been banned from all reporting by now?
Haha yeah I guess, but they were using it to illustrate how mainstream blogging has become. In the ST's defense, I don't think this is their first story on the blog, just the first on local bloggers. (Anyway, I would quibble with the definition of "amateurs"--some lucky bastards make money doing this stuff. Witness Yglesias' recent advertisements.)
If Oxford has picked up "blog," I wonder how long before they get "blawg" (for law-themed blogs) or "medlog" (for med-themed blogs).