The Mind-Blowing Blogosphere

Posted by Hans de Ruiter

Given the millions upon millions of blogs in existence, and the thousands of new ones starting every day, some sort of directory or search-engine for blogs would make sense. Unfortunately, it appears that all too many people agree. A quick search for blog directory or blog search engine brings a mind-blowing number of hits. There is as big an overdose of blog directories and search-engines as there are blogs. This is probably fueled by reports that some people have made money off their blogs; the smell of money to be made bringing in plenty of entrepreneurs.

For someone simply looking to let others know about his/her blog, this is simply a confusing mess. I would expect that people new to blogging in general will be put off by the sheer volume of directories and search-engines. Which one is the best? Is there even a "best" one? Given the number of direvtories/search-engines, are they even effective? 

The only way to find out if any of these directories/search-engines are effective, is to try them out. To this end, I have signed up to two of them, as an experiment. The first is Technorati, the other is Zimbio. These two appear to be more established than some of the others. Other than that, there is no particular reason for choosing these two.

Signing up to these blog directories/search-engine sites presented the first issue with this blog. Most people appear to pick a topic and start posting news articles, tutorials, etc. This blog, on the other hand, is a "web-log" in the truest sense of the work "log." It chronicles the development of this website, its content, and the technical troubles encountered. Some blog posts also cover other technology-related topics. Thus, it does not fall cleanly into any topic. Nor does it match a lot of the "how to" tone of many other blogs. Nevertheless, the information could prove valueable to anyone that is building or maintaining a website.

I am not expecting much from this experiment. My initial impression has been that there is just too much clutter in the blog directory/search-engine space. However, we shall see how the two services that I signed up to perform.

Comments (0) | 8 July 2008