W(h)ither Blogging?

Here's a thoughtful post:

Somehow it seemed that blogging just isn't that hot anymore. The feeling has been exacerbated by the latest slow down in news. My feeds just do not update that often these days. Can it be that the digestion phase applies to blogs just as it applies to startups? In this post we'll investigate whether the blogosphere is going through a digestion phase.

I find this particularly interesting because my impression is exactly the reverse: I find more and more interesting stuff in my feeds. Not only that, but I find this humble little blog is also attracting more attention, particularly among the PR crowd. I've noticed a distinct change in attitude among the latter - unspoken, but clearly there - from regarding blogs as vaguely interesting but not very influential, to seeing them as just as important as traditional media.

I'd go further: the blogs seem to be taking over. At a time when more and more (dead-tree) newspapers and magazines are closing down, or going purely online, and when more and more online titles are starting to run bloggers as part of the mix, it seems to me that the barycentre of digital publishing is mostly certainly moving deep into the heart of the blogosphere.

Of course, the acid test will be during the next downturn, but I'm optimistic. Unlike the publishing excesses of dotcom 1.0, where magazines blossomed with the manic marketing of no-hoper startups, only to wilt themselves when that, er, fertiliser dried up, blogs are predicated on lean and mean. The only ones that will suffer seriously are those that are beginning to bloat towards the condition of traditional, inefficient publications. No names, no packdrill.