Interesting to see how the UK media is integrating blogging and news. The Guardian is the first to do this with "Comment is Free". And it's almost a separate site from their main online paper.
7 days is part way there, using their free model with some comments allocated to stories, but I would doubt they even intended this or would go any further in this direction.
When will something like this happen in the UAE? All dependent on internet penetration, technology upgrades, freedom of expression laws. At some point around 2010, probably.
I find the whole blogging, forum, chatting, news, community all online riveting and see the whole community myspace area all joining up among different communities and not too dissimilar to what we have here at this community blog. However, I see it moving towards, say key coverage areas lead by certain people ie editors that cover the main headlines, the weird and wacky, the same for politics, the same for local news etc etc. Can you imagine that with this blog?
Nachhaltiger Ökotourismus in den VAE
2 days ago
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7 comments:
nope, may cause havoc
I see huge differences between blogging and traditional media in whatever form tradiational media takes. Basically, blogging is completely independent of market and business concerns and editorial restriction. Whatever is "published" is entirely in the hands of the author--except to a very limited degree when a blog or comments might be censored by a site administrator.
It represents a kind of journalistic anarchy. Some may question whether it is a good or bad thing. I personally feel it's all good. No one has to read anything he doesn't want to. True, one can ignore any print or on-air broadcast but these can sometimes be "in your face." Not so, with blogs. They can potentially offer a wealth of information and views to an interested reader or they can be totally disregarded at cost to anyone.
What I'm curious about is how collaborative blogs like UAE Community will evolve and distinguish themselves from blogs on similar topics. There is a kind of organic force at work, I believe, that directs each contributor to compose and publish only those articles or opinions that he/she presumes are apporpriate. Obviously there are no rules, but I believe there is a natural tendency to speak to a perceived audience.
Perhaps this is the one thing that blogs and traditional media have an common. They are guided in some sense by the perceived interest and attitudes of the presumed audience.
Well, this place has a kind of unique function in that it is here to support a specific community - bloggers in the UAE. Unless someone starts http://uaecommunity2.blogspot.com it is always going to have a distinct role, regardless of what it does or doesn't cover.
I suppose this place could evolve into something more structured, but I'm certainly too lazy to help it do that ;)
What you could do, SD, is add a more detailed description of the blog in the header to provide more direction. That would be one easy way..
But I'm not really suggesting that. It's working as it is and something is evolving. Perhaps we'll all be surprised one day.
Bloggers with similar interests are getting together, so I expect there'll be plenty in the future, like UAE Community, linking subject/hobby/interests etc as well as geographical.
The problem in this area is that internet use is so far behind. People still use mobile phones (usually while driving!) for everything and e-mails are ignored, websites are not updated, sometimes for years (look at some real estate sites!)And Etisalat isn't helping.
"Basically, blogging is completely independent of market and business concerns and editorial restriction."
bd,
The above statement is correct only if you talking about UAE but blogging, now days blogging 90% related to market and business, companies started to use it for marketing and getting feed back from consumer and clients and I must say it is great media if used for that function
^^^ If you put it that way, then, I would say "blog," "blogging" are rather nebulous terms. A blog in reality is a web page, and a web page can be used for anything under the sun, including promoting and providing business services.
A blog might be more acurately defined as a web page which presents content chronologically and is easy to compose and upload. Unlike email and forums which are also easy to post to and chronological, a blog allows a lot of graphical content.
The practical result of this function is that just about anyone can publish online.
This anyone-can-do-it quality means that web publishing is no longer limited to companies with deep pockets, or geeks. That's why even though companies are doing it the significance of blogging comes from the fact that ordinary people can now take their place on the web.
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