Looking at our English lives...where would we be without blogs?
Probably with a lot more poetry papers completed and enduring many more painful assignments.
Looking at the big picture...where would the world be?
After coming to the realization that I knew almost nothing about these things we discuss, update, and obsess over...I decided to research “blogs” and find some information on them.It is a little pathetic that I really had no idea when they started, how they evolved, or even why they are called “blogs”.
First of all, the term “blog” emerged as a combination of the original name “web log” (which completely makes sense and I am ashamed I did not know). I am sure there are some fellow AP Englishers out there that remain ignorant to this fact, so hopefully this post helps everyone out. “Blog”(which was added to the dictionary in 2005) can be defined as:
noun
a website containing the writer's or group of writers' own experiences, observations, opinions, etc., and often having images and links to other Web sites.
verb (used without object)
to maintain or add new entries to a blog.
I then did some research on the origin of blogs and found these main events:
 |
| JUSTIN HALL |
1997: Dave Winer launches Scripting News, which he calls the longest-running Web log currently on the Internet. He also gaines praise as a blog pioneer.
1997: Jorn Barger RobotWisdom.com site becomes the first to call itself a Web log (coins the term).
1999: Brad Fitzpatrick launches Livejournal, which combines the online jounalists with the web log concept.
1999: Peter Merholz of peterme.com shortens 'weblog' to 'blog'
1999: Three friends who founded a San Francisco start-up called Pyra Labs create a tool called Blogger!
2003: Google acquires Pyra and its Blogger software.
2003:First official version of WordPress blogging software is released for download and blogging goes public.
And the rest is history!
And the rest is history!
Current data shows that as of 2011, there were over 156 million public blogs in existence!!!
Now you know some facts…so blog on.
Thanks for this delightfully insightful information Carolyn. That was not meant to be sarcastic. I actually found this quite interesting and I had no idea what blogs were until I read this. But I agreee blogs haveno doubt replaced some treacherous assignments. So, I will take your advice, and blog on!
ReplyDelete