Blogtalk Monday July 5 5pm Panel 4
(Shorter talks than before the break)Stefan Glänzer (20six)
Does blogging suck?
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When does it suck?
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no readers,
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no comments,
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no track backs
Power Law, traffic skew, rich get richer, this is bad!
We need more ![[WWW]](http://joi.ito.com/joiwiki/classic/img/moin-www.png){kind=small}
Le Sofa Blogger and more Schockwellenreiter
France and the Netherlands pick up blogging faster than Germany
>> Leo: interesting comment on having toplists to keep bloggers active. This is just like in online computer games (i.e. muds) where its used to keep users on developing their character. Toplist = like "most popular"? Yes Top 100 ... People have to identify with their virtual "avatar". Maybe a blog is just like that. <<
82% of all bloggers are leaving after a few months
Factors for churn (churn is the probability of readers leaving a blog): <<<< Is it really readers?
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less visits
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age of community head (most important factor)
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comments - people leave without comments
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community abuse
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Being Female helps to keep readers interested
Predicting Factors for churn
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Age of community head
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Age of seed blogger
No correlation with external marketing
Typical epitaphs before bloggers close their blogs:
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"Is anybody here?"
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test test test
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I think I need a break... I will be back... Sometime in the future
Mobile Bloggers
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In its infancy
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Difficulty starting up
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Heavy usage for several days
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Complete drop-off (churn)
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If heavy usage for several weeks, then sevearl months of heavy usage <<<<< This is suprisingly similar to the use of workout-studio (fitness) not seen as practical as a stand-alone application expensive
Mobile blogging just by itself is not yet feasible - blogger must have a "regular" blog too, "killer app" for mobile blogging is still missing.
Nico Lumma: "The German Blogosphere - some facts and figures"
"I don't care about the norwegian blogosphere"
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June 2003: 1000 Weblogs
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June 2004: 14500 Weblogs
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includes Austria and CH
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>>> StephanieBooth: political borders much less important than linguistic borders (I'll write something about that regarding CH
Does not contain some German bloggers who blog in English.
blogg.de monitors German blogosphere, gets pings etc.
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like weblogs.com but without David Winer... <<<< This is not bad
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german technorati
Karaoke Blogging
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Data collected in first 6 Month (Jan-Jun)
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Blogs must ping weblogs.com, blog.gs, blogg.de
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no Atom-Feed
MyBlog.de gets more blogs than other blog hosting services in Germany (share of 46%, 20six has 14%, ) myblog.de has no commercials
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steady grow from Jan to June 2004
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average posting frequency 10 posts a month/weblog
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majority blogging during the day - mostly 2pm to midnight
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weblogging is a supplement or replacement to TV
Livelinks (for a month)
very small numbers of cross-linking blogs (<80 Links, average about 30)
Possible explanations for low numbers:
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Lack of Soap-box attitude?
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afraid of expressing opinion?
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hesitant towards new things?
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forums or chat instead of blog?
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In the US during Dean-Campaign and Iraq-war, blogging was "the talk of the village"
[Horst: my suspicion is a different use of weblogs]
Nico Lumma does not give any answers to these questions.
Michael Schuster: "Applying Social Network Analysis to..."
Hubs, Powerlaws, the Ego-Effect and the Evolution of Social Networks
* Social Network Theory * Analysis of twoday.net * Conclusions
Scale-free networks: people do not link randomly Link density and network-buiding as a "natural" process: some people simply have fewer links - not a problem
Connections are chosen for specific reasons Size of the network is a chosen size
People don't link randomly.
Power Law Distributions & Hubs
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"A-List Bloggers"
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"Dead" Weblogs
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Those with cat-pictures
What happens when the social networks are small - i.e 10 people or less?
Governing Principles of networks:
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rich get richer
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Achilles heel: if a hub is removed, the community might collapse
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Diffusion: Hubs play a crucial role in influencing the community (Hubs, like Schockwellenreiter or Dave Winer)
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Growing difference: The more nodes, the bigger the difference between "rich" and "poor" nodes
I need a better background in Social Networks. Every new technology has the potential to create new Social Networks -- but how many new technologists consider the Social Networking Governing principles before introducing their new technology? <<-every (or many) technology (ies) is a chance to revisit these principles though>>
Methodology - how are the networks/[personal] connections measured:
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Incoming / Outgoing Links
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Connections between persons determinded by
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Comments 40%
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Blogroll 40%
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Stories 20%
Incoming links
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Average: 6 Links
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Median: 2 Links
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Power Law
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20% have no links
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60% have <3 links
On twoday.net, users have a different linking philosophy - many weblogs do not consider links to be important.
Community of approx. 600 blogs is held together by just 10-12 blogs - very close "clique" with personal contacts at the heart of the community - hard to become part of this core community. This holds the network together, but it's also a cause of churn if users try too hard to get "accepted" by these "A-list" bloggers, but don't.
Power law seems impervious to "typical" portal strategies for diffusion. How much of this is related to personality, and how much to content? What makes an A-List blogger?
Visualisation using touch graph
Community pressure by A-List blogger heavily influences churn -- the visuals look like those from physicists related to gravity around large bodies in space. How does this impact extraordinarily active, but tiny communities of bloggers? Would you see the same effects in communities of bloggers who are all friends and blog exclusively with one another?
Conclusions
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every node can be reached through 6 connections
DISCUSSION
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Q: roland: Password protected blogs - has any analysis been done on these? (e.g. his sister got interested when Roland posted baby pics).
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Will this happen not with A-List bloggers, but by those who offer blogging
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What about usability? Or the ability to "blog" from a spontaneous impulse? Do minority groups have different needs that traditional blogging doesn't satisfy?
A: 20-6 no data 19% have password protected blogs A: ??? no data - only 10% of community is password protected
Q: blogs & media coverage? A: ??? -> had good media coverage in Austria when they set up the service. This likely leads to new bloggers and resulting churn. A: 20-6: article in times, gained more than 1000 bloggers, only 10 survive (UK)
Q: MB: in 1996 - was worried about the collapse of the web to 1 or 2 sites; similar concern with A List bloggers. This never happened. why?
A:20-6 : it did happen in online auctions and google. (power laws and 80:2o rule are out there)
Suw: welsh (30 blogs, half dead) -- how do you encourage a reluctant community to start using blogs (could be a perfect medium for minority languages/ minority groups) -- so how do we encourage them to (a) start them (b) continue using them?
A: MS: no real recipe for success, best thing is if those who are enthusiastic about it tell others about it (use "contagion") - but it boils down to whether people feel they have something to say or not.
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NL: word of mouth among bloggers and their friends
LE: most important: not functionalities, but what it enables for the community
MS: Blog survey: several types of bloggers
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neighbourhood is important - few, if any outward links strength in seclusion?
NL: communities should not be based on using the same tools
SG: This seems to be a German phenomenon, in the UK this is not the case
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- there are cross-tool coimmunities.
MS: tries to be part of the community where he currently is - maybe that's representative - isn't wanting to know the whole blogosphere like wanting to know every person in the world?
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