- Blogging comes to Harvard :
- In an interview with David Winer, software guru and launcher of Scripting News, one of the Internet's longest running weblogs, it emerges that Harvard has hired him to head up a new initiative called "Blogs at Harvard"
To answer the question of why Harvard would employ David Winder to teach "Blogs at Harvard" we need to look at what a Weblog or Blog is, how it works and why it's so popular.
But first, to get some context, let's look at the "traditional" way to present "news" or other changeable content on the web:
- create a web site
- update pages as and when
- Add new pages and remove "old" ones.
- insert "new" sticker to indicate fresh content
Issues:
- making sure all pages have a uniform look and feel. Templates.
- content quickly gets stale
- labour intensive - need to understand HTML.
- high degree of tech savvy needed to create cool site.
- result is that best sites are those with largest resources to call on.
Weblog or Blog software such as Moveable Type addresses all these issues. In essence, you type in your text into a form and the software generates a new web page which is timed and dated. Thus, with a Blog you can publish on the web:
- easily - HTML knowledge is not needed
- timely - the journal format handles regular updates in an intuitive way
- creative - changing the look of your Blog is fairly straightforward
- connections - links to web content and other Blogs
- popular - google favours Blog sites
- public - invite comments on what you have written
- above all - cool