Classification of Blogs

The different types of blogs according to ProBloger.net in 2008.


There are a myriad of blogs in the blogosphere. Below are some general classifications of blogs, differentiated mostly by its contents:

• Personal blogs – an ongoing diary-like commentary on life. The most traditional and common type of blogs.
• Corporate & organizational blogs – these mainly serve a business purpose, as an internal outreach channel to enhance communication and corporate culture or externally as a public relations and marketing tool. In 2009, the US government under President Barrack Obama introduced the white house blog, garnering many followers and is among the top 100 blogs today. Read about corporate blogs on Nielsen's Alertbox which explains why summaries of many articles draw more reader interest than full articles on corporate blogs.
• Genre blogs – Focus is on a particular or niche subject – for example, politics, travel, photography, food, green living, fashion, education, art, classical music and legal issues. An example is gizmodo.com which is a technology weblog about consumer electronics and offers up-to-date coverage of the latest high-tech gadgets in the technology industry.
• Microblogs – a broadcast medium of shorter postings, usually a sentence or two. A popular microblog is Twitter. A way to capture the moment, it allows instantaneous sharing of thoughts with the blogger’s online community, allowing privacy settings.

Blogs can also be classified by the way they are delivered, such as mobile
device-enabled posting (eg mlogs via instant messaging, text messages or
MP3, etc), video blogging (vlogs) or by the way they are written (eg
typecast blogging where typewritten blogs are scanned and published).

There are currently no standard classification system in place. However,
they are mostly sorted by contents. According to Smich (2010), the 10
different blog types are:

• Cultural Blog: About theater, arts, music and popular culture.
• Business Blog: About business related topics and stock markets.
• Personal Blog: The most common blog. Majority of the people use this blog to generate directly the income or drive traffic to other websites.
• Topic Blog: Focuses on the function such as few of the search engines present currently (eg MyBlogLog).
• Collaborative Blog: Usually managed or written by two or more authors.
• Science Blog: Used to disseminate data and information.
• Eclectic Blog: Focuses on niches collaboratively or individually made.
• Directory Blog: Focuses on specific events and news, acts as a directory.
• Educational Blog: Commonly used by students to post research papers, articles or their findings.
• Forum Blog: Permits two or more bloggers for posting discussion on the net.

Margaret Simons (2008), on the other hand, classifies them into 9
categories based on their agenda / intended role:

• Pamphleting blog:  
• Digest blog
• Advocacy blog
• Popular mechanics blog (aka tutorial blogs)
• Exhibition blog
• Gatewatcher blog
• Diary blog
• Advertisement blog
• News blog

While I personally believe there will never be a standardized classification
system as the genres and delivery of blogs will continually evolve, I do
quite agree with Simons' agenda-type categorizations. What do you think? 

Related posts:

• Understanding Different Types of Blogs
• Different Types of Blogs
• Discussing various Blog types
• BLOGS: Choose Your Flavour
• Blogs: The Magic 8  

Reference
Nielsen, J 2010, Corporate Blogs: Front Page Structure, Jakob Nielsen's Alertbox 9 August 2010, viewed 8
October 2010, <http://www.useit.com/alertbox/blog-front-pages.html>

Simons, M 2008, Towards a Taxonomy of Blogs, Australian Policy Online, 11 September 2008, viewed 10
October 2010, <http://www.apo.org.au/commentary/towards-taxonomy-blogs-0>

Smich, M 2010, Different types of blogs, myhosting, 8 April 2010, viewed 10 October 2010,

<http://myhosting.com/blog/2010/04/types-blogs-2/>

Image source:
<http://www.problogger.net/archives/2008/04/30/what-type-of-blog-do-you-run-poll-results/>

Video source: Socialtraining.wetpaint.com, accessed 9 Oct 2010. 
<http://socialtraining.wetpaint.com/page/Micro-Blogs>

The blogging phenomenon

 

According to blogpulse.com, there are now a total of 147,850,563 identified web logs (aka blogs): with 50 new ones created daily. An average 1 million blog posts are indexed daily.

Evidently, there are more people sharing their thoughts online since blogs were introduced in 1998. Blogs are not simply a social phenomenon but have become a prerequisite – transforming politics, business and society. Media professionals, modern journalists and even governments recognize the increasing power of blogs and web citizens are absorbing the information flow almost as soon as news breaks in this participatory journalism medium.

‘Under specific circumstances – when key weblogs focus on a new or neglected issue – blogs can socially construct an agenda or interpretive frame that acts as a focal point for mainstream media, shaping and constraining the larger political debate’ (Dresner & Farrell, 2004).

In this period of accelerating digital change, interactive blogs have become de rigueur communication and have given rise to citizen journalism, quite a different ballgame from mainstream media which are regulated by government and corporate directives.

That said, there is no central organization of the many types of blogs in the blogosphere. Thus online communities with similar viewpoints differ from early day civilizations, for one could always leave the community. In this age of many-to-many communication, it is entirely up to the individual to identify and analyze viewpoints and decide on a match.

Reference

Blogpulse Stats 8 October 2010, viewed 9 October 2010, <http://www.blogpulse.com>

Drezner, D W & Farrell, H 2004 The power and politics of blogs, 2004 American Political Science Association.

Image courtesy of: http://jollyblogger.typepad.com/photos/uncategorized/thinkbloginversion_1.jpg