Did you forget Samuel Johnson's birthday?

Samuel Johnson was both a great writer and a great character; according to the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography "..arguably the most distinguished man of letters in English history". With his dictionary doing so much to define the English language you would expect the 300th anniversary of his birth (last Friday) to have made a bit of an impact online. Unfortunately, despite some great programmes on both BBC Radio 3 and BBC Radio 4, the public failed to be overly moved.

In fact according to Google Trends, whilst September has caused a slight blip, interest in "Samuel Johnson" has been falling over the years.

The blogosphere shows no more interest than usual, and far less than the announcing of the Samuel Johnson prize.

Obviously some historical figures stand the test of time better than others. The graph below shows the leap in interest for the mere 200th anniversary of Charles Darwin's birth (the red line at the bottom provides a comparison with Samuel Johnson).

The two men have very different legacies, but nonetheless I can't help feeling that Samuel Johnson has been unfairly overlooked online.

The Distraction of the Real-Time Web: I want to get off

Whilst everyone seems to want to get on the Twitter train of the real-time web these days, I think I want to get off and take my time to blog a bit more.

Since I first went to the Birmingham Social Media Cafe back in January I have thrown myself into Twitter head first: following 124 people, posting 1,403 updates, and even going along to the BrumTwestival! However there is a downside: I blog less.

Those who read my blog may not think of my blogging less as a downside, but blog posts are as much for me as my readers. They are an opportunity for me to put down my thoughts on the web in a fairly coherent manner. The real-time web means that I am more focused on what is happening right now, rather than reflecting on what has happened.

The real-time web has it's place for breaking news and customer engagement, but for some of us a slower blogosphere (or even traditional publishing) is a more suitable place to explore our thoughts. Let's hope the world doesn't go too far exchanging quality for speed.

The Social Web and a Leicester Hotel Owner

People realise that a static web site is not enough to promote their business, but that doesn't help them embrace the social web. There are a multitude of different social media technologies available, and the person needs to select the right ones, learn how to use them, and understand the culture of the different communities using the different technologies. Unfortunately the successful adoption of social media takes time; there are no quick fixes.

I have just spent the last two hours on the phone to a friend discussing how he can make the most of social media to promote his hotel.

The Old Approach
His hotel had a web site http://www.campbellshotel.com/, but it didn't particularly do much for the promotion of the hotel. Whilst there are design issues (don't even think about looking at it with Mozilla), the primary reason the web site failed was that people didn't come across it. If you Googled Campbells Hotel the site would be number one, but looking for a hotel in Leicester? No chance.

The New Approach
Engage with the online community, and let the world see more than a brochure. As such I have encouraged him to revolve his new online presence around a blog (http://campbellshotel.blogspot.com/), incorporating other technologies such as Twitter (@Campbellshotel) where appropriate. Whilst such an approach is natural to those involved in social media, it's a big leap and a big commitment for someone who has little experience of social media.

The Philosophy
Whilst I struggled to explain how the social technologies could help, and that it wasn't about sending Tweets to everyone you came across; his moment of epiphany came with the comment:

"It's like liberal evangelism"

Exactly. It's not about trying to force doctrine down someone's throat, it's about demonstrating it in the way you live your life; it's not about Tweeting adverts at everyone, it's about demonstrating the way you run your business.

Nb. If you have any advice/suggestions for a small business owner trying to make use of social media I'm sure commenting on his blog would be appreciated. http://campbellshotel.blogspot.com/

How to become a top tech blogger (in the UK)

Each month Wikio publishes a list of the most influential technology blogs in the UK blogosphere. As my own blog is likely to be a contender for the least influential tech blog in the UK I decided to take time to visit each of the top 30 most influential technology blogs in the UK and draw together a few rules for becoming a top tech blogger.

What should you call your blog?
Anything you like. Whilst there are obvious benefits from the “it does exactly what it says on the tin” approach to blog naming (e.g., Phones Review), qwghlm.co.uk’s success clearly shows that your blog name doesn’t even need to be pronounceable to be popular. If you can't think of anything, don't want to pigeon-hole your blog in the longterm, or just want to see your name up in lights, you can always join the 17% of the top 30 who have chosen to name their blogs after themselves.

What makes a good blog post?
Anything goes, from long wordy pieces (e.g., qwghlm.co.uk) to shorter bite-sized pieces (e.g., Gadgettastic). With billions of internet users out there, there will be millions who prefer each of the different styles, so feel free to blog in the format most appropriate to you.

Should a blog stay on topic?
It makes no difference. Whilst I often worry that my own eclectic mix of blog posts will put people off subscribing to my blog, it seems as though my lack of subscribers is more to do with the quality of the posts than what I am posting about. The most influential technology bloggers have few qualms about posting about anything that crosses their minds: football, politics, music (or is that music as an excuse to post about scantily dressed women?). Unsurprisingly collaborative bloggers are more likely to stay on topic than personal blogs.

How regularly should you blog?
Several times a day, extremely rarely, or somewhere in-between. At one end of the scale you have the collaborative blogs which are more akin to traditional media with numerous writers publishing many stories each day (e.g., TechCrunch UK), whilst other blogs average only one or two posts a month (e.g., Simon Willson). Xlab shows that you can even stop blogging and continue to be listed as one of the top UK bloggers.

Can you make it on your own?
The spirit of the blog as an alternative to big media is alive and well with many of the wikio’s most influential bloggers being individuals, however there is no harm in being part of the traditional media scene: dot.life (The BBC's technology blog); The Red Ferret Journal (columnist and feature writer for the Sunday Times); The Guardian Technology Blog (surely no explanation required).

So, in summary:
1. Call your blog something.
2. Post in some format.
3. …at some point.
4. …about something.
5. Buddying-up with a national media organisation won’t do you any harm.

Some would say that an examination of the most influential tech blogs shows that there is no hard and fast rules for becoming a top tech blogger, just write about what you want in your own style, and if people visit they visit. However, I think by following my consise summary readers will have no excuses for not becoming one of the most influential tech bloggers by this time next year...all I need to do is buddy-up with a national media organisation for the complete set.

Twingly v. Technorati

At some point, lost in the mists of time and place that is the web, I signed up to Twingly (yet another blog search engine). I just returned to the site for the first time since signing up, as they sent me an email highlighting their new 'blogrank' and 'top 100'. Whilst their blogrank isn't worth mentioning (primarily because mine is a pathetic 'you get 1 for turning up'), it is always interesting to see lists of the 'top bloggers', especially when there are such differences between the lists.

The most noticeable difference is the lack of a 'Huffington Post' on the Twingly list; in fact it's not even in the top 100! Seemingly Twingly still have some work to do regarding their crawling and identifying spam. One feature that is nice about Twingly is the top 100 for different languages; whilst the top-100 English language blogs is seemingly out of my reach, breaking into the top-100 Greek language blogs seems a distinct possibility. αύριο θα μάθω τα ελληνικά

Does Bibliometrics need a Blogger?

Whilst searching on Google Blog Search for 'webometrics' I noticed that the usual webometric blogs are listed as 'Related Blogs':

As I had just been blogging on the subject of bibliometrics, I decided to see which the related blogs on that topic. Surprisingly there aren't any:

[Although two blogs are 'related' to Scientometrics].

If blogs are a useful way for sharing the latest news and information in a particular discipline, as well as the promotion of a discipline, then surely bibliometrics would benefit from the odd bibliometrician blogging occasionally [...for the sake of inter-disciplinary relations I will eschew the joke about bibliometricians being odd]. Admittedly the webometric blogs are not the best example of academic blogging, but it is a burgeoning online community of sorts.

"One third of bloggers have received free products"

I'm beginning to take the general attitude to my blog personally. Whilst I kept calm when I read that the mean income from a blog with advertising is $6,000 p.a., to find that a third of bloggers have received free products through their blogs is a bit hurtful.

According to Technorati the top categories of free products that everyone else seems to be receiving are: DVDs, music, books and video; Computers; Electronics. Do I not read? Listen to music? Watch DVDs? Spend a small fortune on electronics I can't afford?

Admittedly music and DVDs are slightly out of the remit of this blog, and I don't currently have the traffic to encourage large companies to send me the latest laptops or mobiles for testing, but I wouldn't mind receiving the occassional web/library-based book. These things cost me a fortune. It should be noted, however, that I can be quite a harsh reviewer. A highlight from my review in the latest Library Hi Tech (26(3)):

...this book suffers from the substandard quality of some of the research... pieces that pique your interest only to suddenly be cut short, or, more annoyingly, misrepresent personal opinions as objective research

Technorati's State of the Blogosphere 2008

Technorati are releasing their annual state of the blogosphere during the course of this week. Giving a round up of who is blogging, how often they are blogging, and what they are blogging about. It shows that whilst I epitomise the average blogger, that isn't enough in the scale-free network of the web.

The average blogger is male, 18-34, 'college' graduate, and have a household income over $75,000. They have been blogging over two years and half have a second blog.

However, whilst I blog regularly and find myself firmly in the top half of active blogs (1.5 million blogs posted in the last 7 days, Technorati ranks me 601,571), I earn nowhere near the mean annual revenue for those with advertising: $6,000. My current Google AdSense earnings: $16.61. The reason for this discrepancy is the power-law distribution of traffic and earnings; most of the bloggers are hanging around in that long tail. If Technorati has decided to show the mode average of blogs with advertising, it would probably be have been nearer to my measly $16.61 dollars.

Did everyone leave the blogosphere without telling me?

When you have a number of things on the go at once, your blog and your RSS feed-reader are inevitably the first things to suffer. You have no time for writing any posts of substance, whilst you are all too aware of the potential for whiling away the day if you dive too deep into the blogosphere, as such you are wary of starting either. However, after finally finishing a book review that has been hanging over my head for weeks at 2.30am, I approach my feeds with pleasure this morning. Not only would I have the time to give more than a passing glance to the stories that piqued my interest, but I would have time to write about them if I so wished. Unfortunately it seems that the blogosphere has gone on holiday.

Despite not having the opportunity to check my feeds since Friday morning (a weekend to the mere mortal is a lifetime to a blogger), I found that it was filled with a rather measly 170 posts, barely half a glance's worth. This lack of new information was then couple with my so-called open desktop (as open as the average bank vault) refusing to allow me to install Google's Lively Virtual World, something I have wanted to have a look at for a couple of weeks.

So all in all it has been a rather disappointing start to the week. Could the blogosphere please let me know in future when it decides to go on holiday.

Blogging is far from dead

When I started 'Webometric Thoughts', almost ten months ago, there was a lot of talk about the death of the blogosphere in favour of the newer (and shinier) social networks and microblogging. Hitwise figures, however, show that far from dead traffic to blogs and personal websites is at an all time high (in the UK at least): Blogs and personal websites account for 1.19% of all UK traffic.

The new high is particularly impressive as it shows traffic to blogs and personal web sites rebounding from a dramatic fall during the first three quarters of 2007, from just over 0.8% of the traffic in January down to just over 0.4% of the traffic in August. It was August that I started to blog, and the blogosphere was unsurprisingly discussing its own demise.

Whilst the blogosphere has weathered the storm of social networks, and is in a stronger position to weather the possible coming storm of microblogging (if Twitter ever gets its act together), the statistics give no insights into why there has been an increase. Have blogs and personal web sites responded to falling traffic by improving the quality of their sites? Is it a greater emphasis on blogs by the big players (e.g., Windows Live Spaces & MySpace Blog)? Or is it all the result of small changes in the Google algorithm promoting the heavily interlinked blogs?

Whatever the reason, blogs and web sites will need to improve if the recent traffic increases are to continue, probably including aspects of social networks and microblogging, as well as technologies not yet thought of. Hopefully, however, blogs will continue to be primarily independent affairs that are not too reliant on the whims of the big organisations.

Drudge: An example of what is wrong with some New Media

The blogosphere always seems to be having a bit of a love affair with itself: They are a great fighter for unbiased freedom of information, whilst the traditional news sources feed us the slops of whoever has the biggest pockets. Whilst that may make the average office-bod feel like a South American freedom fighter, the truth has a lot more to do with lots of little people sounding-off with few restraints. The latest big story that was broken on the web without any restraint was that Prince Harry was fighting in Afghanistan. The story was broken by the Drudge Report whilst the traditional media had agreed to a news blackout until Harry returned.

Whilst others may question whether the media should have had a blackout, without it there would have been no story, and Harry's deployment to Afghanistan had the potential to bolster much-needed support and coverage of the war at home. The breaking of the story reflects Drudge's self-interest rather than the public interest. Did the public benefit from the breaking of the news? No. His breaking of the story is on a par with the lowest form of paparazzi journalist that knows the upskirt shot of the latest young starlet will increase a paper's sales, whatever the consequences to those involved.

Scientific Articles v. Blog Posts

Both scientific articles and blog posts share the currency of recognition. However, whilst citations are rather dry affairs that are relatively few and far between, blogs get far more interesting critiques from a far wider audience. It's a shame that scientific articles aren't more like blog posts.

The sad truth is that my off-the-cuff comments about the web and the progress of my allotment (http://plot13.blogspot.com/) receive far more readers than any of my scientific articles. Over the last few months the number of unique visitors to my Webometric Thoughts blog, according to Google Analytics, have been steadily increasing (Nov-434, Dec-633, Jan-807(so far)). Whilst these figures would barely register in the blogosphere, they are far higher than could ever be hoped for in the academic world where you generally find yourself questioning whether even the referee bothered reading the article fully.

Even when the articles are read, and you are given a citation, they generally refer to some obscure generalisation you have made, barely worthy of a citation: it is more to do with the citer building authority for their own paper by showing how much they have read. In comparison a blogger does not benefit from referencing your post, and has the freedom to discuss it as little or as much as they wish. Therefore coming across a blog reference can be much more rewarding (I just came across my personal favourite today).

It would be great if the academic world could combine the informality of the blogosphere with their traditional publishing activities. Unfortunately most academics see blogs as a drain on their time rather than an opportunity to broaden the reach of their research and get more useful feedback. Admittedly my eclectic mix of posts has done little to further the blogging cause in academia, but surely there are some academic bloggers out their which truly show the potential of blogs.

Blog Wars

The gauntlet has been firmly thrown down by Oh, what a tangled web we weave..., , or has it merely been picked up after I threw it down previously? Unfortunately I have not had the opportunity to respond as my PhD thesis has been consuming my every waking moment, but I now have a couple of days respite. The blog readability test that showed my blog to be of a higher standard than the other webometric blogs at the end of November, now shows the Finnish webometrician to be of a higher standard.

Competition between blogs should always be welcomed. It forces us to up-our-game, critically analyse our posts, and the standards of our blog as a whole. Too often the top blogs start to coast, and those have built a following based on well written posts start to fill with pictures of their children's birthday party. As webometricians, competition lets us look more critical at the various tools that are available for comparing blogs and web sites, especially those that don't seem to be working in our favour. It is worth noting, however, that despite my lack of quality posts of late, I continue to lead webometrics.fi in a number of indicators:
Technorati Ranking
Webometric Thoughts - 871,446
Oh, what a tangled web we weave - 2,910,025
Alexa ranking
webometrics.org.uk - 3,816,072
webometrics.fi - 11,904,548
I will take the competition as an opportunity to up my game, but will Oh, what a tangleed web we weave... ?

10 years of blogging

According to the BBC, yesterday marked the coining of the term 'weblog'. Although there are lots of claims by the 'citizen journalist' lobby about their collective power and importance, its difficult to truly assess how much of a positive effect blogs have had on the news and media landscape over the last ten years. Whilst there are well documented cases of the blogosphere's success, these are too often overly-trumpeted rather than any real discussion on the potential short-comings of the blogosphere.

'Citizen Journalism' can be dangerous, irresponsible and just downright rude

It was only a couple of weeks ago that I last questioned the slipping standards of Mashable, and I find I am doing it once again. Ironically regarding an article defending the so-called citizen journalists. Professional journalists have been calling into question the quality of so-called citizen journalism, the article responds by insulting the traditionalist's looks and stating she has 'senile dementia'.

I am constantly amazed by the arrogance of the blogosphere, willing to point out the speck in their enemy's eye whilst ignoring the plank in their own. Little of what appears in the blogosphere equates to our traditional idea of what journalists do, instead most stories rely on information collected by the mainstream media (Tech sites are often a notable exception). Also editorial standards are extremely low, as exhibited in posts that merely insult individuals on unrelated factors such as looks. Rather than bitching the bloggers should take some of the criticism on board and work out how they can improve.

There are advantages of mainstream media, and advantages of the blogosphere, but we are mistaken if we believe they are in the same game.

Blogs as the social networking future

A recent post over at GigaOm shows that I am by no means alone in believing that the future of social networking may be in the increased personalisation of blogs and personal homepages rather than social networking sites such as Facebook etc.

The question is whether the blog publishing systems can become as user-friendly as the social-networking sites.

One Hundred Webometric Thoughts!

As the title of this blog would seem to suggest, this is actually the 100th blog posting on my 'Webometric Thoughts' blog since I posted my first entry a little less than 4 months ago. It therefore seems an appropriate time to reflect on both the blog, its posts, and the visitors.

When I started the blog I stated in my profile, as is still stated in my profile:

I am hoping that the blogosphere will offer an opportunity for feedback as well as the sounding-off of my personal opinions.

Unfortunately I seem to have failed to successfully take advantage of the potential of the blogosphere; useful feedback requires well thought-out opinion pieces rather than off-the-cuff thoughts on the latest sites I have come across. Nonetheless I have found the blog a useful place for sounding out my thoughts on different topics, it forces me to keep up to date with the ever-increasing number of blogs I follow, and acts as a useful aide-mémoire for some of the hundreds of sites and discussions that I come across in the average week.

Looking back at some of the posts and the aspect that immediately hits me is the wide variety of topics that I have posted on; a factor that would be likely to restrict my from getting much of a following, even if it was better written. However the eclectic blog follows my own eclectic thoughts and interests, and as I am the only person guaranteed to read every posting it will continue as such. My only disappointment is that I do not have the time to blog on every subject or news story that catches my eye, if the blog changes in the future I hope it will be by trying to include an increasing number of short entries.

Whilst my blog has very few regular readers, it is amazing how many people turn up if you put something on the web. According to Google Analytics, since I installed the necessary tracking code within my blog (9/10/07) I have had 835 absolute unique visitors, from 56 different countries/territories, from the US and Russia to Oman and Nigeria. Whilst for a long time the most noticable abscence was the French, I was finally honoured with a visit from one of them just last weekend! Whilst the numbers aren't particularly high, and the most unique visitors in one day is a mere 29, they do seem to be slowly creeping up. In fact, by the looks of today's numbers, I am on course to finally break the 30 unique visitors barrier.

Whilst blogging isn't necessarily what I expected, I have nonetheless enjoyed it and would recommended it to anyone who's thinking about it. Just don't have too high expectations.

Web 5.0: Where we live on the web

Everyone seems to want to be the person to define a web number, first web 3.0 went, and now web 4.0 has gone:

If Web 2.0 is the rounded corners and the Internet as a platform, and Web 3.0 is seamless integration of the various tools built on the platform, Web 4.0 must be algorithmic incorporation of that data into something useful.

So I thought I would get in and define web 5.0:
Web 5.0 is when quantum computing provides us the opportunity to upload ourselves to the web rather than just our data.
Obviously there may be a few more technical stages before we can solve the planet's overcrowding problem by living in Second Life 2.0, but what is the point of having a decimal point if we don't use it? Dewey would be turning in his grave.

Whilst there will be those who say that people won't want to be uploaded, I think it is equally likely that there are people who don't want a fully integrated and documented life with every aspect detailed and tagged! Too often the blogosphere focuses on technological capabilities and how geeks would like to use the web, rather than how the mass want to use it.

Even if the web does develop in the way people predict, do these changes really necessitate new web numbers? If we accept that the move from web 1.0 to web 2.0 is a paradigm shift in the way many people view the web, then surely the introduction of the terms 'web 3.0' and 'web 4.0' require equally large changes in perception; the proposed definitions seem more like tinkering round the edges.

Blog conversations

The best way to learn about the blogosphere is to be involved in the blogosphere, however much that will make you want to pull your hair out and bang your head against a wall. Whilst blogging can be a joy when writing down a few musings and reading a few comments, when those comments turn into a conversation it can be one of the most exasperating moments. It feels as though you are having a conversation at a party where everyone else has had a few drinks, and you are the only sober person. Whilst that is not to say that my opinions are necessarily more lucid than the next person's, it is merely that they make more sense to me; equally other people's opinions will feel more rational to them.

Blog conversations can be exasperating due to their unique combination of being asynchronous, public, personal, and providing room for long comments. Whilst other forms of communication may contain some of these factors (e.g., email-asynchronous and chatrooms-public), it is the combination of all these factors that make a blog conversation so potentially exasperating.

As blogs are both asynchronous and allow for the inclusion of long comments, people include long comments. Whilst this may seem a rational response, after all you would be conversing on the same subject for weeks if you limited yourself to one comment at a time and then waited for a response, it creates a debating environment that people try to 'win', rather than one where ideas are discussed rationally. Postings are not read rationally and responded to as a whole, in context of the whole conversation, but rather disingenuously with tactics that would make Eric Berne blush. The must-win mentality is only exaggerated by the public nature, whilst the personal nature of the blog to one party makes it very hard to leave a conversation whilst the other continues promoting opinions you disagree with.

Nonetheless there is a time where continued conversation makes no difference, opinions have hardened and an understanding of different perspectives is more distant than it ever was. It is at this point that you have to bite the bullet and walk away, it's annoying, but if you don't it becomes a slow walk to the mad house.

What is a blog? Does it have to be social?

The other day I read an article that probably contained the worst description of a blog ever:

In a nutshell, a blog is a "do-it-yourself" website

Anyone who engages in the blogosphere would realise how rotten a nutshell this particular comment is, however the borders of what is and is not a blog are pretty vague. To me a key ingrediant of the blogosphere is the engagement with other users, unless we allow others to comment on our opinions blogs are little more than vanity publishing. Unfortunately it is not always a simple process to comment on some people's blogs, we can find ourselves hampered by blogs not allowing comments, having moderated comments, or having a comments section that is damned-near impossible to find!

Relating to the above, high ranking, linked-to examples:
-Yes, Seth Godin shows trackbacks, but I don't necessary want to add a blog post on a topic.
-I don't understand why Andrew Keen utilises moderated comments when he then passes spam and pointless insults for publication.
-Why does Dave Winer have comments when they are such a bugger to find?

Spam and offensive comments are probably more of a problem to high profile bloggers than me, although I was privileged enough to receive my own comment from a BNP idiot, and I can understand why they put safeguards in place. It is however bloody annoying to the fairly-respectable majority, who come across a comment to which they want to respond and can't.