What exactly is a blog? (BB#1)

Sooner or later you’ll hear the word blog and wonder “What exactly is a blog anyway?” Certainly, the next question is bound to pop up in your mind “What is the difference between a blog and a website?”

In this post you’ll learn:

• What is a blog?
• What is a web log?
• What is a blog post?
• What is blogging?

First things first: a blog and a web log are the same thing (blog is just short for web log.) When I first saw the word “weblog” I thought it was “we blog” because I had seen the word “blog” so many times that I thought “weblog” was just a catchy fad phrase.

But I digress.

The definition of a blog

The basic definition of a blog (or web log) is an online journal or diary.

Yep. That’s it. (Kinda ruins the suspense doesn’t it?)

The entries or blog posts are listed in chronological order with the most recent blog post positioned at the very top and the last blog post buried deep somewhere waaaaay back in the archives section.

But blogs have become so much more than just personal accounts of what time the writer got up, fed his or her cat, felt on the commute to work, and how lunch didn’t sit well. (If blogs were only that, then they wouldn’t be so popular.)

Blogs cover a whole kaleidoscope of topics from ranging from current news stories, deep insights on life, reviews of products, music, and movies, and most likely any other topic that you can think of (seriously.)

What is a blog post?

A blog post is simply one entry or one “article” that is on a blog. If you look at the side bar (the long strip on the far, right-hand side) you can see the heading called “New Stuff”. This is a listing of the most current blog posts (or entries, or articles, or whatever you wanna call them).

What is blogging?

Blogging is the crazy act of writing blog posts (which is what I do.) If you like to write and would like to share your advice, opinions, and your mother’s secret recipes, then blogging might just be for you.