I notice that several newsletters to which I subscribe now offer the option of downloading the newsletter on my computer instead of receiving a paper copy in the mail. Downloading is less expensive for the publisher, and it is more convenient for some (but not all) of the subscribers. I've downloaded some newsletters myself. I would be happier if the publishers simply published blogs instead of newsletters.
The purpose of this essay is to explore the differences between newslettering and blogging that might influence one's decision.
What Are Blogs?
A few years ago it was called "creating your own web page." That's a wonderful thing to do but it takes a lot of work. More importantly, it takes a lot of technical skill and know-how. That kept away a lot of people who were interested only in the pages' content, and who didn't wish to invest the skill or the time to make a web page from scratch. Blogs evolved as a compromise way to do it.
Typically, a blog is a personal web page that is hosted on a blog provider's own web servers. For example, my blog is hosted on blogger.com. The provider sets up the mechanics, and gives you a somewhat limited choice of graphic designs. All this is done with simple on-screen instructions and tools. After that, the author concentrates on content. Quite literally, a non-expert can set up a blog, select all the options, and be writing content in less than 15 minutes.
There can be as many kinds of blogs as there are kinds of written materials. Here's a few
- Public blogs: A place where anyone can post their own articles without permission or intervention by other people. Forums on popular newspaper sites are examples of public blogs. Public blogs tend to deteriorate in to flame wars of incivility and name calling.
- Personal blog: My own blog www.dickandlibby.blogspot.com is an example of a personal blog. I write it, I edit it, I post it. I'm totally responsible for what goes on there. Nobody else can write articles for the blog, although I can elect to allow others to post comments. Personal blogs gain wide readership only if the writer is skilled. Some of the most popular personal blogs deal with politics or other hot topics.
- Group blogs: Like a personal blog, but only members who are trusted with the right password can post articles or comments, or perhaps even to view the blog. With the right group of people, a group blog can work very well and with minimal effort. Nobody needs to volunteer to be webmaster, censor or editor.
- Managed blogs: Somewhat like a magazine or a newsletter, authors submit articles to the editor, and the editor decides what gets published. As I see it, the differences between running a managed blog and managing an electronically distributed newsletter are slight.
- Forums: There are not huge differences between group blogs or managed blogs and online forums. The graphical format of presentation is slightly different. Forum threads often start with a simple question, whereas blog threads tend to start with a more substantial article. It is seldom that an author spends and hour or more composing and refining the content of a forum post.
- Wikis: The canonical example of wikis is Wikipedia.org. Wikipedia allows the public to read and to add to or modify articles on millions of subjects. It establishes rules for posting, editing, and resolving conflicts. A wiki can be much richer than a blog because it gets input from many people. Consider a cruising guide type of article about some travel destination. One person can write the article originally, but others can add their own prose or relate their own experiences. Since different people are interested in different things, a group wiki article can be much better than any single person's version. As things change, readers who see incorrect or out of date information on the article can change it.
Numerous sources provide free hosting for blogs. Probably the biggest and best known is blogger.com which is owned by Google. Blogger.com provides the servers, the backups, the operations, free storage up to 1GB, and easy to follow on-screen tools for composing and graphical formatting of blogs.
There are also sources for free software to manage forums and wikis on your own web server. Notable, is wikipedia.org which makes the exact software and documentation used to run Wikipedia available free of charge. One does not need to invent or maintain the software oneself.
Effort
Producing a newsletter takes a lot of effort. The editor must set the theme of the publication, determine the volume to print each issue, solicit authors, enforce deadlines, edit, format, print, and distribute. When this is done on a volunteer basis, it can become a big burden. Therefore, it is probably safe to say that many volunteer-based print publications are constantly in search of volunteer effort.
A group blog, on the other hand, requires minimal effort. The group decides who is allowed to be part of the group. Someone must set up the blog initially and to hand out the passwords to members. After that, members write the articles and/or comments and post them themselves. There is no day-to-day management needed. Occasionally, the group may want to delete or modify something that was posted, but that should be rare. The drawback with a group blog would be to keep the members sufficiently focused. Individuals may want to steer the style of content in one direction or another. If too much freedom is allowed, chaos results, and boredom and disinterest soon follow.
Running a managed blog is a lot like managing a print newsletter. The editor must set the theme of the publication, solicit authors, and sometimes edit the copy. However, individual articles are posted as they come. One need not marshal a right sized group of articles in to an issue. There are no deadlines. The editor also doesn't have to spend time formatting, or distributing the product. Overall, managing a blog is similar to but much less effort than managing a printed newsletter. That's what prompted me to write this essay in the first place. I see that editors slave to manage a printed newsletter, and then distribute it electronically anyhow. Their jobs could be made substantially easier if they switched to a managed blog.
Publication Delay
All authors share the frustration of publication delay. That is, the time between when an article is written to when it is published. To publish in a bi-annual newsletter, one might wait six months to see one's effort in print. Submissions to certain scientific journals can take a year or three before publication. Even submissions to a daily newspaper might not appear in print for a week or two.
A blog article, on the other hand, can be published instantly. On my personal blog, as soon as I push the PUBLISH button, publication is complete. The same would be true on a group blog. Actually, instantaneous is too fast. Sometimes I regret it, and immediately call back the article for more refinement before publishing. I think that the ideal delay would be one hour.
Submissions to a managed blog, I expect would be published in 1-5 days. Those days allow time for the editor to read the article, perhaps copy edit it a bit, and then publish it. A major advantage of a managed blog over print publications is that articles are published (posted) one-at-a-time rather than being assembled in to an "issue." Therefore, the publication delay for managed blogs or group blogs is very much less than the delay for printed publications. To the authors, that is a major advantage.
Content
Each communication form tends to develop its unique personality. Spoken conversation is different, than letter writing, which is different than emails. Text messaging, reports, manifestos, books, novels, posters, phone conversations, cell-phone conversations, and the many other forms of communication, each tend to encourage or discourage different kinds of content. Things we write with fountain pens tend to differ from graffiti written with a spray can or a paint brush, even though all three are writing instruments. This is not a matter of discipline or edict, it just happens naturally. Blogs are no exception.
What differs between blog articles, and say, magazine articles? I find that since I blog often, that I feel no constraint on the article size. Some of my blog posts are only a few sentences long. Others would take many pages to print. I also find that blogging daily leads me to a contemporaneous style of speech. It is like the difference between a diary and an autobiography. I also think that blogging in public differs from a personal diary. As I write it, I think of my audience. With a diary, there is no intended audience.
Another important factor is that when blogging, I worry only about myself and my audience. There is no editor and publisher who might reject my article. When I write for a magazine, I find it impossible not to write to please the editor, writing what I think he/she expects. The same could happen with a managed blog, but not with a group blog.
Who knows what creative juices and what backlog of untold stories stand to be unleashed as more and more people begin to blog? I suspect that there's a lot.
Design
Here's a delicate subject. There are millions of web pages that have absolutely atrocious graphical design. Each of them, no doubt, was designed by someone who thought that it was nice. The truth is that almost everyone considers themselves to be good graphical designers and good critics of design, yet in reality only a few skilled and talented people do it well.
My personal example of bad design is the (successful) magazine Wired. I love Wired's articles and content. I hate their design. In particular, Wired's use of tiny fonts and non-contrasting backgrounds makes it impossible for me to read many of their articles. Twice, I've subscribed to Wired, only to cancel when it runs out because of frustration. I suspect that Wired does it deliberately. I'm an old fart. Old farts have more difficulty reading those pages than young turks. I think Wired is trying to actively discourage old fart subscribers.
It is no mistake that the graphical design of magazines and newspapers around the world are remarkably similar. Over the ages, the best designs have risen to widespread copying and adoption, while poorer designs disappear. It is very important to do so, because if the readers don't like the design they tend to buy fewer copies.
Blogger.com offers a choice of graphical designs, called styles, to choose from. Those designs are pretty much alike. I always choose one of the most popular designs because I expect it that it's popular because readers like it. I do not spend any significant time or effort on my part to create my own design. I also find it easy to select a different design from time to time, while retaining all my existing content. That provides a freshness for my readers.
Those who slave over creating their own personal page design however suffer from the from:
- Having to learn a lot of technical know-how about HTML.
- Risking bugs in their design that make it difficult or impossible for readers to see the content. Have you ever clicked on a "dead" link?
- Risking bad design that turns people off.
- Lock-in. When something better comes along, they find that they invested too much time and effort in the old design to change. Worse, they may find that they can't adopt a new design without re-keying their entire archive of content.
Editing
In many cases, editorial control and discipline, is what gives a publication a character, and a level of quality that is the main attraction of readers. At the other extreme, sometimes inept editorial control is stifling and can drive away both authors and readers. Unfortunately, once again the world is full of people who fancy themselves to be good editors, but the reality is that only a few of them have the skill and talent to really do it well.
The editing problem is much worse in the case of volunteer supported publications. Before offering criticism of the existing editor, one much consider the chance that he or she may resign and you may be asked to take over the job. Because most of us are unwilling to dedicate so much of our time to the volunteer effort, we self-censor ourselves before speaking out. Because of that, it would be reasonable to assume that dissatisfaction with amateur publications is underreported.
A publication intended for the general public needs to attract readers. If they are not well written, readership will drop. People read volunteer supported publications because of affinity to a group. That makes them less subject to feedback by the readers. Blogs can go either way. A political blog, for example, must compete for readers with thousands of similar blogs. A club activity blog will probably be read by club members, regardless of quality.
Media Based Advantages
Readers can arrange to get notification of new posts to a blog by RSS. RSS delivery means that you get a one line message stating the title of the new article the same day it is posted. The reader can then quickly decide whether to ignore it, or to click on the line to see the full article.
Readers can archive large volumes of back issues on their hard disk. Doing that with paper takes up a lot of space. For example, Practical Sailor is a newsletter with consumer reports on products. I gave up on saving old issues. They took too much room. Instead, I keep 5-10 years of back issues on my hard disk and search for specific topics when I want them.
Blogs can, and usually do, embed hyperlinks in their text. The links can take you to related information or allow the reader to dig deeper in to the source of an assertion. Mutual cross linking between related blogs is a major aid for readers to find precisely what they like.
Both blogs and paper publications can include still pictures, but only blogs can include video and audio and widget enhancements.
Articles printed on paper are easier to read. One can read standing or sitting or lying down. One can read in bed. One can fold the publication and stuff it in a pocket. Reading on a computer screen is generally less convenient and less pleasurable than reading words on paper. However, computer screens can be used in the dark, and they can enlarge the text to make it easier to see.
Recently, electronic book readers have gained some popularity. They have substantial advantages over computers for reading, but they still find it hard to compete with plain old paper.
Also recently, young people became fond of doing everything with their cell phones. Although the prospect of reading a long book on a tiny cell phone screen sounds horrible, it is much easier to imagine if the authors adjust the content to bites appropriately sized for phones. On the very day I write this, millions of enthusiastic young people are eagerly awaiting the message on their screen telling them who Barack Obama's choice for Vice President will be. Blogs, unlike magazine articles, find it easier to write shorter, but more frequent incremental updates to their stories. Doubters should look in to the popularity of twitter.com.
Computers must be backed up. They are much more likely to break and to risk losing all your stored information than paper-based media are. Sure you can lose your whole library of books to a major flood, but you can lose your entire computer to a simple spill of your coffee cup.
Computers use too much electricity for constant use on my sail boat. Paper requires no electricity. E book readers require some power but very little.
Blog readers can send copies of the article to their friends much easier than they can send paper articles. They can choose to send the text or merely send a hyperlink. Paper articles can be copied on a copy machine by people with little skills.
Search engines provide ways to discover things that interest you that can't be matched in the paper world. With traditional publications, readers are dependent on the editors to locate and select those articles of interest to the readers. On the web, readers can much easier do their own searches. They can also much easier make use of social networks to let peers make suggestions and recommendations. Think of netflix.com, and amazon.com, or for the ultimate, go to Google and search for googlezon.
The impulsive nature of many bloggers combined with the ability of search engines to search far in the past sometimes leads to embarrassment. Bloggers may be shocked to find out that their future employer or their grandchildren may be able to discover and read the childish things they wrote in their youth and that the historical record on the web is almost impossible to erase. The very delays and obstacles of paper publications tend to filter out such impulsiveness at the front end.
Don't forget that search engines also search the entire history of back articles. Using a blog, I can write an article whenever I feel like it, post it immediately. Any time in the future, someone searching for that particular subject may find my article with a search engine. This very article is an example of that. Nobody asked me to write it. It just occurred to me that I know enough about the subject to write about it. I'm confident that some day in the future, someone will be confronted with the proposal to convert from paper to blogs, and may research the question on the web. That person will likely find this article and read it while their interest in this specific subject is high.
I do not believe that there are any significant legal differences between blogs and paper publications with respect to copyright. However, because of tradition, paper publishers tend to pay more attention to copyright and to make efforts to protect their rights. Bloggers on the other hand tend to be more impulsive and to publish their material instantly without consideration of future legal protections. If copyright protection concerns you, give it some thought.
Distribution
Distribution of paper-based publications is expensive. Distribution begins with making arrangements for printing and paying for that. Then one has to arrange for outlets, be they subscribers or retail stores or even sidewalk stands for free newspapers. Whether sent by mail or delivered to a store by truck, delivery is expensive and time consuming.
Distribution of content electronically is very much cheaper and less labor intensive. No wonder that publishers of all kinds of traditional paper publications are interested in electronic distribution.
Distribution of blogs is inherent in the blogging host site.
Conclusions
If you read this article, it is highly likely that you are personally involved with making a decision about publishing electronically in addition to or instead of traditional paper-based publishing. I hope that this article was useful to you. If so, I would appreciate an email note to let me know.
Obviously, I am not a neutral commentator. I am a blogger and I am enthusiastic about this new media. Nevertheless, I am still very fond of my paper newspapers and magazines. I would hate to see them go away. Blogs are not for everyone and not for everything. It is up to you to decide in your own case.
