The blog JOHO has a brief piece on a relatively new service called Blog Explosion, which is sort-of like a Yellow Pages category-ordered directory of blogs.
JOHO readers who have tried Blog Explosion left several comments, generally noting it’s early-stage randomness with respect to the blogs it helps you find left something to be desired (although it’s potential was also acknowledged). I noticed an interesting comment left by daniel luke.
It reminded me of the richness, the human voice and wisdom accessible in the comments section of many blogs … and how this terrain is still virtually excluded from the deep and wide linkage – the sociality of thought, expression and dialogue that blogging affords us.
I wrote about this once in a post I called Authenticity and the Peanut Gallery. I certainly hope that one day we will have access to the human music and magic that blog comments offer.
What daniel describes could also lead to aggregarious social networking, maybe.
On JOHO, daniel luke said:
The reason I personally would like searchable comments is because I’ve spent a lot of time and energy posting to other people’s blogs. Pieces of my writing are floating around out there in the blogosphere, and it occurred to me that it would be nice if some how I could get it all back.
Thinking about it some more, I concluded that it would be good for the common weal of the blogosphere because by allowing a particular person’s thoughts to be traceable through the blogosphere, a clearer, more nuanced picture of an individual would emerge than would be possible by just looking at the comments posted to one or two blogs. The blogosphere audience would come alive, so to speak.
By allowing searchable comments the blogger and the audience would be placed on almost equal footing. In fact, it would almost make them one in the same thing: my blog could simply be an aggregation of all that I’ve posted on other people’s blogs. Everyone writing anything would be making their own blog. A blog would be created simply by doing a name search which would, of course lead to myriad other blogs thereby reinforcing the whole blog idea.
I think all of this would give people a much greater incentive than they now have to participate in blogging by writing comments. Again, your collected comments would be their own blog. As it is, I’ve noticed that people don’t post that many comments. There are exceptions to this, but as a general rule it holds.
By addressing this, the blogosphere becomes twice what it currently is
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