Chapter 1. What Is a Blog?

What is a blog? A blog—short for web log—is an online diary that looks like a web page. It is easy to create and update by changing text, photos, or links to other sites. This chapter covers the history of blogs (don’t worry, it’s a short history), places to find web publishing software appropriate for blogging, the elements that comprise a typical blog, and quick ways to find blogs that you want to read.

A Short History of Blogs

It is ironic that a nickname for a tool that creates simple web pages has had such an impact on early twenty-first century culture. Although earlier technologies such as news wires or amateur “ham” radio networks share blogs’ community-making function, blogging took specific form around the ...

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