Blogs.

Today, is difficult to meet a person who does not know what a blog is, and never in his life visit the blog. I personally, have learned about this phenomenon in the year since 2010. Since the topic of today's homework - as new media blogs - I'm in the second part of the chapter, be sure to touch on this topic, but first a little history

1994. The student Justin Hall first began to keep a diary on the Internet. Sometimes the creator of the first blog called programmer Dave Winer known, but most researchers do not agree with this statement. They argue that the blog Weiner first gained wide popularity among Internet users.

December 17, 1997. Jorn Berger, founder and editor of the online journal Robot Wisdom, for the first time used the word weblog. It was formed from the phrase logging the web (can be translated as "keep a diary on the Web") - has become a verb into a noun.

April-May 1999. Peter Merholts, creator Peterme blog, spread the term weblog into two parts - we blog (can be translated as "we are blog"). Based on the word blog was created and a new verb - to blog, meaning "to perform any act aimed at the maintenance of the online journal".

August 1999. A small computer company Pyra Labs, based in San Francisco, created a Blogger portal. It was the first free, public, and extremely easy to use tool, which gave rise to the creation of the blogosphere.

December 1999. Rusty Foster (company Pyra Labs) has created software Scoop, which was first used on his Kuro5hin site. Prior to this, Internet users can publish on other sites my notes, but they (notes) has decided the fate of a small group of editors and administrators. Scoop dramatically changed this scheme: Now users can moderate comments on their own. Website Kuro5hin was devoted to discussion of problems of technology and culture. He became a very noticeable phenomenon, but in 2002, Foster was faced with a catastrophic lack of money needed to maintain the site. Foster turned to the users for help, and less than a week, has collected $ 37 thousand. Probably, it was the first in the history of bloggers campaign for voluntary collection of funds for their common offspring.

At the end of the year there were about 50 blogs in the world.

November 2000. Home politicization of blogs. Freelance journalist Josh Marshall has launched a blog TalkingPointsMemo, to discuss the "crisis of Florida" - with mixed results counting of votes cast for the presidential candidates in Florida.

The number of blogs has reached several thousand.

September 2001. Bloggers have become the first source of information for the "big" media. New York authors online diaries were reporting from the scene of the attacks of 11 September 2001: they publish pictures, describing events which began, eyewitness accounts, rumors, etc. Some researchers now believe September 11 the date of occurrence of political blogs. Then event messages online diaries authors were treated seriously.

On a number of journalism faculties of American universities began studying the phenomenon of blogging.

2002. Probably the first major political scandal caused by the actions of bloggers. The ceremony honoring the oldest member of the US Senate Strom Thurmond, Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott said that the US would become the best country if Thurmond once would have won the presidential election.

The first war of blogs. After the invasion of Iraq, many US soldiers set up their blogs, which describes the vicissitudes of military action. Similar blogs created and Iraqis (the most popular of them is likely to become a blog Salam Paks). Military blogging has become very popular among people interested in the course of hostilities.

Well-known Internet entrepreneur David Sithri created the first search engine for blogs - Technorati.

2003. The Oxford English Dictionary first included the word weblog, webloging (blogging process) and weblogger (the person who creates blogs).

Close AOL portal (aka ISP) for the first time made available to all its users the opportunity to create a personal diary.

Blogs come in big politics. US presidential candidate Howard Dean has created a blog covering election issues, later renamed the Blog To America. Many American politicians began to actively campaign and raise money for the campaign using blogs and bloggers.

2004. Blogs engaged in media companies. The company Gawker Media has created Wonkette blog, which publishes rumors, derived from the corridors of power in Washington.

Traditional media - newspapers, magazines, TV and radio - became publish reviews and blogs invite popular bloggers as a commentator.

Webster Dictionary of American English language for the first time included the word blog.

The first conflict between traditional media and blogs. Broadcaster CBS aired a program in which archival documents have been demonstrated, according to which President George W. Bush was careless soldiers, avoid sending to Vietnam only through patronage. This transfer came in the midst of an election campaign. Bloggers - Bush supporters - have shown convincingly that CBS used the documents are fake. CBS apologized.

The largest US parties - Democratic and Republican - have accredited a number of bloggers in their party congresses as representatives of the media. The influential magazine Foreign Policy, who interviewed a number of leading political commentators and US journalists, came to the conclusion that most of them regularly visit the page of personal Internet journals. According to a study conducted by the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press, about 4% of US Internet users constantly turning to blogs for information.

Bloggers first manifested themselves during a disaster - the Asian tsunami. Bloggers have helped hundreds of disaster victims find missing relatives, get help, and so forth.

The number of blogs is from 2.4 to 4.1 million.

2005 year. Business magazine Fortune published the names of the eight bloggers whose opinion global business community can not ignore.

Advertising Age magazine has published the results of the survey, which was conducted to find out how many working hours Americans spend on browsing blogs. As it turned out, the number of active readers of blogs is about 35 million -. It is a quarter of all working people in the US. On average, each of them spends on blogs Scan 3.5 hours per week, which amounts to 9% of the total length of stay in the workplace. This means that throughout 2005 a massive interest in the blog turned to the US economy disappearance of almost 5 billion. Working hours. If we estimate the magnitude of these losses on the basis of average hourly pay in the private sector, which is $ 16, then the price will approach $ 80 billion.

The first cases were noted blog layoffs. On Delta Air Lines employee fired after she put her picture in the form of a page of his diary. Microsoft has fired a contractor who put on the blog Apple Computer svom photos.

2006. According to Technorati estimates that the number of blogs is doubling every five and a half months. Every day on the Internet appears about 75 thousand. New pages online journals, that is, on average, one page per second. However, no more than half update their records within three months from the start of their activities. About 9% of blogs are created automatically - basically, it's spam.

According to a study Pew Internet Center, 12% of American teenagers create blogs. Teens much more "blogalizated" than adult residents of the United States. 19% of teens have created their own blogs, while 28% regularly read these pages on the World Wide Web. For comparison - the blogs is only 7% of adult Americans, only 27% of them regularly read other people's online diaries.

The company Hostway conducted a survey and found that one-third of Americans have visited blogs before, and the same - never heard about them. 52% of respondents believe that bloggers should have the same rights as journalists working in traditional media. However, the level of confidence in the blogs is much lower than in conventional media.

A number of large companies - for example, Sun Microsystems and the Microsoft - said that a positive attitude to the fact that their employees create blogs.

China began to actively pursue the authors of blogs that publish materials contrary to the general line of the Communist Party of China (companies providing services to create online diaries, are forced to close the "bad" blogs).

The number of existing and constantly updated blog has reached 15-18 million.

2007. The US Army has released a special statement to the military, who are personal online diaries. Instructions of this type has not yet appeared in the world. It pays particular attention to the placement of photos and other images that contain a "critical or sensitive information." For example, it is forbidden to post photos taken during the operations; explosive devices (detected or explosive); Image captured, killed and wounded; image security systems and so on. In case of any problems with the instructions understanding servicemen prescribed coordinate their positions with the command. Interestingly, these rules must comply with not only military but also civilians, carrying out contracts of US forces in Iraq, as well as family members (military and contractors). The exact number of military bloggers unknown. Some online journals, authors of which are fighting in Iraq, soldiers and officers, gained considerable popularity. There are cases where bloggers have signed contracts to write books.

Further, there is no point in looking for any date since then - simply growing numbers of blogs and the cost of advertising in particular developed ones!

Part two!!!

For those blogs are becoming an alternative source of information - their number, attendance noticeably increased. Blog authors tell their audience about news, give comments and value judgments about different events in the world and the country.

But can blogs be a full-fledged alternative media, if the validity of information and quality of supply to them, no one checks?

With the emergence of newspapers, radio, television, people began to receive a variety of information processed in prepared form. These information materials have been developed over time, high professional requirements. Added the theme of engagement. State media are often criticized for the lack of freedom of speech, formalism, and silence inconvenient state events.

After the collapse of the USSR, many restrictions on the media were removed, there was a lot of room for experimentation and fantasy. In the case of the Estonian-language media to the audience, everything was more or less in the framework, I do not know whether that morality. Not quite sure, but probably just did not have the resources and the desire to compete with the Finnish entertainment channels. And so any wild talk shows and soap operas dibilno Estonians still managed to escape. But the Russian-speaking part of Estonia got the full !!! True in the beginning no one really complained. And even in the daytime media "liberated" twist advertising means "male power" condom "on the phone Flirting", show nude clips of American singers and bawdy series.

Today, when the above-mentioned media are experiencing a decrease in demand for its services, the first place among all sources of information taken online. On the Internet and did reigns complete "freedom" - not only obscene and prohibited advertising clips, but also, for example, video calls from terrorists, their execution and massacre of the people.

I noticed a trend that many people gradually began to neglect the official sources of information and to pay attention to the author's blog.

Blogs began to compete with other media.

What causes such a competition? For a small monthly fee, anyone is able to show and prove themselves in front of an audience of millions. Thus, he gets equal opportunities and equal starting conditions with professional journalists, regardless of their income and the availability of education. He begins to compete with professional media.

Who eventually wins the competition for the minds of men, for the attention of the audience?

It is not always worth it! So, in 2012 the most popular blogger in Russia has become a prostitute ... (Learn and social networks - prostitutka_ket). Man very lowly profession.

For what she was doing, higher education and great intellect is required. Maybe she knows how to find an approach to customers, partly referring to her work as a psychologist. However, in his notes in the blog and social networks, it has long gone beyond their professional observations. It provides comments on a completely different topic, and its constant audience approves some of her advice on life, life and outlook.

People "peck" on a trivial subject, not wanting to broaden their horizons and think about serious things.

If the culture will follow the ideology of such unstructured competition and give up claims, expertise, analysis, quality and ethics of the media, the media will work on the degradation pathway.

Indeed, why people are so interested in blogs?

Many young people interested in politics, claim that the news on the TV for a long time do not look - everything is distorted, tailored to the official version, and submitted boring and too formal, often - willfully. A much more accurate information is best to look on the websites, in social networks, blogs. There's an informal and accessible explain everything, will present a fun and provocative, and above all - in accordance with the personal views of the speaker rather than at the behest of the state.

On the other hand there are a lot of blogs that are professional journalists, historians, scientists have blogs and much more. And, for example, in small states still do not have such serious problems with blogs, such as in the same United States, where the former porn star paid a lot of money just for the fact that it is in his blog to write about what a thread there, Senator is goody-goody!!!

Internet journalism has become a new branch of journalism, alternative media. But while her work is not ordered, it raises many questions. It is necessary to think as they say! And slowly start the whole thing controlled, for example, to block the blogs openly provocative character, for example, in which cultivated the image of a mega-riders. However, to be honest, as long as our government is not in any way affected. First place in the top blogs of 2017 in our country, in a typical commercial blog with 13556 clicks such attendance can not influence at least something!