# Is Tony Perkins and AlwaysOn taking blogging to the "next level"? - Author: Joichi Ito - Date: 2003-03-22T09:20:58Z CNN"Just like the Internet was 10 years ago, blogging is popular with an underground culture that is doing it for the love and passion," said Tony Perkins, who edited the recently folded Red Herring technology magazine and last month launched a business blog called Always On Network. "Now there are people like me coming along and trying to figure out how to package it," Perkins said. "It's time to take it to the next level."Interesting thought. What level are we on? I guess it might look "underground" when you first join, but blogging has already past the "underground culture" phase, I think. Having said that, I'd like to continue doing it for love and passion. Nick Denton says this about the article.Nick Denton One of the most clueless articles in a while, on the weblog phenomenon. Stars Tony Perkins, editor-in-chief of the defunct Red Herring, and his new venture, a super-blog about technology that I can't even find through Google.Henry Copeland blogs some thoughts and an exchange with Tony Perkins where Tony gets a bit defensive. Elizabeth Spiers blogs:Capital InfluxThe funniest thing is Tony's attitude toward Henry—the who-do-you-think-you-are indignation. This is how blogs work, Tony. You generate content. Other people comment on it. And you're not always going to like what they say.Tony comments on Elizabeth's blog in humble lowercase:Tony Perkins to the lovely elizabeth spiers who runs this site, i promise to work harder. i must say that the fact that a person as obviously as smart and qualified as you are can't find a single thing of value on AO is certainly dissapointing to me. if you don't mind, i will let you know when i finally post something that you might find useful. btw, i appreciate the feedback so far.So... Where am I on this? I've signed up for and played around with AlwaysOn. It looks sort of like a blog, but doesn't feel like a blog for a variety of reasons other people have blogged already, but the articles feel like magazine columns and it doesn't have the linked-in/real-time/community-participation element that real blogs have. For instance, I think Dan Gillmor does a great job of blogging and having a weekly column separating his interaction with the blogging "underground" and the readers of his column. Two different groups of people. On the other hand, I think Tony is turning on a lot of people in Silicon Valley and getting bigshots to blog is a good thing. I do think it would be better to try to learn how to blog before evangelizing though. I am a venture capitalist trying to figure out how to make money. Blogging feels like 1992 to me. Lots of tool builders, lots of buzz, pre-Yahoo, pre-Amazon. I'm doing what I did in '92. I'm immersing myself in the technology and the community. I started my blog June last year and am finally figuring out the nuances, which makes blogging so cool. You really have to do it and immerse yourself in it before you really "get it." I think the risk that Tony faces is that "taking it to the next level" before you understand the current level is that you might not bring all of the good stuff with you to that level. I am also trying to "take it to the next level" but I'm part of a group effort. Anyway, I thought the interview with Idei was great. I think Tony's helping everyone become more aware of blogging generally and I wish him the best. It reminds me a bit of how I alienated the Japanese diary community when I started ranting about blogs in Japan. They were upset because I had not given them credit for popularizing the form in Japan and acting like blogging was a new thing. Maybe a lot of the negative reaction to Tony is a similar feeling. I do think that there are a lot of smart people in the "blog underground" that Tony should probably interact with more and calling us an underground culture is not the best way to make friends. --- #### Categories Blogging about Blogging