you're damned fucking right

[rone]

"Blog" and "moblog" are not transparent words. "Televisor" was not as good a term as "television" or "television set", and so it went away. I expect the same to happen to "moblog", if not "blog", in ten years. Because they're geek words. They're codemonkey words. (I can hear Cory Doctorow yelling, "l337, damnit!") They are crap, artificial, ugly kludges of words.

        - Warren Ellis

Comments

[wisn.livejournal.com]

"Blog" has the right specificity, even if the term postdates what it names by a good five years (there were blogs long before there was 'blog' - for pete's sake, YAHOO was a blog, per one axis of the genre, and there've been others dating back to the nascent days of the web - once folks put content up that wasn't research-related, they were inevitably updates of links to likeminded material). On the other hand, it lacks the euphony that a lived-in word needs. "Moblog" and other iterations ('mobile blog' - eg, writing on the road, in cafes and camped in front of apartment buildings with open wireless stations) are, on the other hand, overspecific since they neither refine per technical or taxonomic needs nor identify a specific genus that merits its uniqueness. It's shades of "B2B", "B2C", and all other sorts of terminology that the non-technical overlayed with supposed technical meaning for no good reason than the desire to contrive a genre and make money or fame thereby.

Or, in other words, since this form is exclusive to the web and unique because of it, why is a single term for it suddenly popular some ten years later? The hypemongers have something to rally around, that's why.

Since I'm old and crusty I consider 'blog' to be a weak alternative to 'web journal', 'journal', or what it portmanteaus: 'web log'. On the other hand, my other blog is called 'blog', because that seems to be what the kids are calling it these days. Deriding the form because of the word is wrong, and I have no intention of doing so, particularly since I've kept blogs in one form or another since 1994. And the inevitable backlash is whipping up just as quickly as the overlaying of ridiculous submedia (mobile blogging, photo blogging, audio blogging).

[zadcat.livejournal.com]

"Web log" isn't a good choice because, let's not forget, a web log was originally, and is properly, the name for the hits log on your server. - the thing that Wusage analyzes.

Damn thing's a blog. You guys are beginning to remind me of Abe Simpson.

[ronebofh.livejournal.com]

"That doll is evil, i tells ya. Evil! Eeeeeeviillll!!!"

"Grandpa, you said that about all the presents."

"I just want attention."

[ronebofh.livejournal.com]

As a sysadmin, i find this use of "Web log" anathema, because logs are the output of programs, not humans. Yes, ship captains have kept logs for centuries, but combine "Web" and "log" and we're talking about unique visitors and various Apache formats.

I deride the form only because of the inevitable crap that it produces (indeed, the fact that i even keep this damn thing updated suffuses me with irony).

One might also remember

[vardissakheli.livejournal.com]

that a ship's log was not originally a general journal either, but just a listing of the number of knots on the rope pulled out by an actual wooden log thrown off the stern.

The etymology of "blog" is clear: "web log" -> "weblog" -> "we blog." I'll be surprised if "weblog" or "web log" doesn't survive. I'll be surprised if "blog" does, outside of geek jargon. I haven't heard it yet from anyone who hasn't heard it directly from someone who does it.

When talking about blogs IRL, I generally say "online journal," figuring that has the best chance of being understood.

How do people generally pronounce "blog"? Does it rhyme with "dog" or with "flog"? I only remember hearing it from one person so far, and she says the latter.

Re: One might also remember

[ronebofh.livejournal.com]

Um, yes? If "dog" doesn't rhyme with "flog", maybe you should seek a speech therapist...