History of Blogging

In 1998, a handful of blogs existed in the form on online, diary-like forums.  Most blogs were personal in nature creating a voyeuristic like community - "I'll write about ME, and you READ it!!!"

A slow trickle of blogs were created in the next few years, but the opinion of many changed when presidential candidates in the 2008 election created blogs to attract readers.  Now, most media outlets and corporations have blogs; even The White House has a  blog.

With the availability of new hosts, such Blogger.com, blog nation has exploded. Experts report that every second, someone creates a blog.  However, many have stopped counting as the numbers, to some degree, don't matter anymore since most people now see the medium as a legitimate source for information.

If you want to read more about the history and evolution of blogging, Rebecca Blood's books and her blog Rebecca's Pocket are good sources to explore.  She offers an insider's view of blogging since she was on the blogosphere frontier back in the 90s.  You could incorporate some of Blood's articles and her blog itself into a classroom in a number of different ways.

However, if you are contemplating starting a classroom blog or a blog of your own, Will's ThoughtStream: Seven Ways to Find Time to Blog is another good resource for motivating you to create and post.