Why do people blog?

It is very interesting to know "why people blog?", you can get an overview of the bloggers who are involved in blogging for some reasons. It was fun for me to search for this topic, and this huge list would give you an idea of what motives/reasons bring you to this vast world of blogs.

I have written a 2 post article which was a compilation of a lot of blogger's view about "why do I blog". This post is an edited form of those posts, which are still present at my former blog. (The links are given at the end of the article.)

*** At "I help you blog" Philip Liu (blogger),who is New York City-based publisher says:
"I had something to share and I wanted to connect with people who had similar interests in blogging and making money on the Internet. I enjoy, as a hobby, creating websites around interests I have.I’m also hoping to use I Help You Blog as a medium to improve my own blogging as I participate in various online community projects."

*** Why do we blog? is a survey list of 36 bloggers who answered this question. The post is long, so I leave it as a link to read it yourself.

*** James Cleverly said:

I have decidied to create my own meme!

Five reasons why I blog:
1. To show people that politicians can be human too.
2. To prove that I am not dead!
3. Because my wife was fed up with me going on about politics at home.
4. Beacsue I worked in the communications business and I thought it was be useful to "understand" blogs .
5. I thought it would make me taller, slimmer and more attractive.

*** Why do marketers blog?:

I think Marketers blog for several reasons. I know this is why I like to blog:

1) it's fun.
2) it keeps me learning.
3) it forces me outside of my comfort zone.
4) it helps me stay creative.
5) it gives me a way to express my thoughts and keep them organized.

*** Jorgen Thelin is an enterprise software architect and he is a senior Program Manager for Connected Systems Interoperability Standards at Microsoft at Redmond.

He anwered that "From a corporate viewpoint, the main purpose of my weblog is to engage with the other thought leaders and technical opinion formers in the industry. There are two main reasons for doing this:

To validate that our company's technical ideas and thinking is correct and applicable across a wide range of situations and circumstances.

The other reason for my weblog is more personal.
Despite my initial concern that I would rapidly run out of things to say, I have found that I do have a lot of technical opinions and thoughts that are good to air. Going through the process of writing those opinions down and posting them for public consumption and feedback has really helped me crystallize my thoughts in many areas. I guess blogging releases my ideas from my brain more, and provides some closure for my thinking.

*** Douglas Karr owns a marketing, developmen, and technology blog. He says:

I like to seek and pass on information. I have throngs of family, friends, coworkers and clients that ask for my opinion and I love to give it to them. it is what I’m good at.

I like to listen.
I like to read.
I like to learn.
And, I love to share what I’ve learned.

Sharing is even more important when I’m wrong.

*** Brad Touesnard is a web developer, and says:

Sharing My Passions
"I am passionate about a lot of things. Business, web development, the environment, and comedy to name a few. Blogging allows me to share my experiences in these areas without spamming a bunch of unsuspecting people. Updating Friends and Family
I live a fast paced lifestyle leagues away from my homeland, so blogging is a great way to let all my family know what I’ve been up to. The same is true for my friends from high school, university, etc. Since Googling my name brings up my blog first, it’s easy for old friends to track me down."

*** Maria Palma owns the blog, which is a member of the "Know more media" network of business related blog. She says:

When I first started blogging, I did it for the sole purpose of sharing random thoughts and ideas that came to mind. Now my blogging hobby has turned into a full-blown career which has put me in contact with so many wonderful people. Never in a million years did I think I would be making a living through writing. Yet, here I am!

So, why do I blog?

1. To share my stories and experiences. I believe that each of us has a story to tell which we can share to help others. Each and every one of us is an expert at something. Why keep that wisdom and knowledge to yourself?

2. To connect with other like-minded people. I love to read about and learn from other people who blog.

3. I love to write. I feel compelled to do it. It was what I was born to do. When I was four I begged my parents to get me a typewriter....and the rest is history.

4. The internet fascinates me. I love the fact that you could create a website and make money at the touch of a button. I love that you could literally connect with thousands of people and be able to help and uplift them in some way or another through your words.

5. To have something for people to remember me by. My future grandchildren can simply log on to the web and see all my work. Isn’t that amazing?

*** Molly E. Holzschlag shares her web development work and personal thoughts from her blog. Her answer was quite long, but I quoted it in details, as it was interesting. She says:

"It seems that when a blogger develops an audience and gathers a group of friends, colleagues, supporters or critics, that demands begin to be made on that blogger by the audience.

You know about these demands, you’ve found them on your own blog, if you have one. Demands like: Post more often. Post less. Stop blogging. Blog more technical articles. Blog more personal topics. Blog about your cat. Delete rude comments. Don’t delete rude comments. I hate you. I love you. Will you marry me? Will you fuck off?

It goes on and on. And it makes me wonder, at what point do we decide our blogs are in fact no longer our own and modify our behavior to adjust to the audience demand?

Some people see their blogs as a publication, others as having a specific agenda (buy my stuff), others as being wholly personal and up to the whims of the person blogging. Blogs are interesting to me when there is a full personality there, writing about topics that appeal precisely because of the context of an individual’s perspective. Sometimes I’m interested in how to roast great coffee, sometimes I want to share with others their sorrows and joys as well as my own, sometimes it’s all about learning a new CSS technique.

I don’t think there’s any one way to blog, nor is there a right way. I do know any person who keeps a blog should have the right to determine who they’re blogging for and why, and that reading blogs is a bit like T.V. in that if you don’t find what you want on someone’s blog, chances are pretty good you can change the virtual channel and find something that suits you better.

I’m absolutely certain that I blog for myself. My blog is the all-me, all-the-time station. That’s its purpose, and if zero, ten, or ten thousand people read or stopped reading, it wouldn’t matter. I’d blog to an empty house or a full one. For me, blogging is an outlet for all aspects of my nature whether personal or professional, as my blog description clearly states. My desire to please people suggests, at times, that maybe I should let my audience drive my content. But my instinct demands that I stay true to what and who I am, not what others want."

*** Anders Jacobsen gave a reply:

"Why I blog (not sorted in any particular order):

I use my blog as a public and at the same time personal "backup brain" (i.e. I can google for "andersja keyword" later to find info I remember to have jotted down previously; examples here and here)
I like to practice my English writing skills. English being my second or third language (depending on the definition of the two Norwegian languages as one or two distinct languages) I definitely need the practice.
People read my stuff & comment. I like that :-) I also like inbound links from other bloggers...
as Christian says in the header of his blog: "fordi sjansen at noen bryr seg............... teoretisk er tilstede" (Because the chance that someone actually cares ... is theoretically present). See also the point about comments and links above.
I guess the philantropic statement "creating order in the Chaos of the Internet" is a bit lofty for one person to claim but collectively all the bloggers have some sort of search engine influencing power, and with Google's recent purchase of blogger, maybe we will see blogs being used more and more as annotators for search results online (there are simply too few resources in ODP compared to the daily stream of blogged links?)
having had some sort of personal online prescence since '95, blogging was a natural continuation - I was subconsciously just waiting to find a tool to make it easy.
Using Movable Type, typing up & publishing a quick note can take as little as a minute or two. Convenient for the "backup brain" purposes."

*** Adam Lasnik says:

"I blog because...
- I enjoy the process of writing.
- I know that people enjoy reading what I write, and I get pleasure from their satisfaction.
- MovableType is a fun and fascinating toy to play with.
- I feel that through blogging I can help friends and future friends better understand what makes me tick, which in itself may hopefully lead to more harmonious relationships.
- Sometimes I need to get stuff off my chest... either wonderful exciting stuff that's making me bounce around, or contrastingly depressing stuff that's weighting me down.
- From a minor perspective, the addition of content to my site increases my site's visibility and desireability, and hence revenueability :D
- It's a bit of a showcase for (enlightened) future employers."

*** Dale Medley owns a blog about "Opinions,news,internet,computer and technology", says:

"It is a hobby primarily. When people ask what is it you do with your computer I just give them my url. I have problems with grammer and spelling(to much beer and pot in high school I guess) maybe blogging helps. I dunno. I have an opinion about everything blogging helps me unload excess thoughts. I like technology especially the internet. The internet is the last user defined form of entertainment, beats the hell out of television, radio, newspapers, and magazines. A good blog, forum, or news and comments site is like a chat room on steriods and it is a lot easier to establish a conversation with strangers than it would be at the library or local coffee shop."

This is an interesting link to the post about academic who blog. As an academic, I believe that blogging can be very effectively used in academic sector.

This is very detailed post, so better read it here:
*** Academics and blogging

*** Egon Willighagen is postdoc at the Wageningen University & Research Center in the NL region. His hobby is open source programming. His blog is about "Chemblaics" a science that uses computers to address and possibly solve problems in the area of chemistry, biochemistry, and related fields.

"I started blogging in October 2005 to reduce my workload: involved in open source chemoinformatics projects, I quite often emailed to mailing lists about interesting websites/projects/events etc. Not uncommonly to multiple lists, which required me to tune the email to the list. I realized that blogging about it, would make it possible to no longer post it to mailing lists, and, therefore, reduce my workload."

*** Word Streamx is a real estate business blog, and provides a detailed answer with the title:

45 Reasons You May Be Blogging - What’s Yours?

The blogger sums up the post with these trails:

"My trail of eight blogs state…

--a faster and better way to create newsletter articles
--a strategy for getting published
--a low-cost way for small business owners to market online
--a method to communicate and connect-especially important for business owners
--satisfaction for some inner need to share
--being prolific
--skills development
--character development
--traffic and sales
--wakes me up
--creative and imaginative
--global connector
--educational to seek out educational nuggets in the blogosphere
--way to reach out and help people grow their business
--it’s fun
--puts me in direct conversation with my audience
--helps me connect to my daily purpose
--blogging is a kick butt SEO tool
--blogging keeps me connected to what is new
--blogging puts me in a community of people affecting change
--it’s easy
--I love the connection with other bloggers
--it serves my community
--it brings me huge amounts of traffic
--it makes me money
--it’s good for business
--relationship building
--market research
--self expression
--cuz it make me one of the cool kids, right?!
--it’s good for business
--self expression
--building relationship with my readers
--marketing
--research and testing
--it’s fun
--it’s a great way to capture my thoughts
--I get to meet and greet and interact with interesting people every week
--I get to express my thoughts and engage readers in interesting conversations
--it’s a nice tie-in for my copy writing business
--It’s a great way to capture my thoughts
--I get to meet and great and interact with interesting people every week
--I get to express my thoughts and engage readers in interesting conversations
--it’s a nice tie in for my copy writing business

A few other interesting learning points showed up for me. One is that a few of the bloggers talked about why they originally blogged and how that has changed for them now that they are blogging. So maybe it is time for all of us to take a moment to reconnect with our own reason why we blog.

I blog on my irregular / regular basis because,

"I love to write - and I found that the only way it happens is on blogs (I write in 3 different ones) - and now that I’ve been blogging for over two years I find myself more relaxed about getting a post out there and do it because I want to and not feel that I have to blog.
I love to learn - every thing you may want to know or didn’t even know you wanted to know you can find on a blog
self expression - most of my real self expression happens on Knee Deep which is my more or less personal blog.
I enjoy sharing knowledge, ideas, thoughts and resources that can help some one be better in their business and break through their own glass ceiling - and a blog allows me to do this with a larger audience than my one on one clients
I love to connect with others."

A detailed article where blogger has asked same questions to fellow bloggers: Why you blog

Note: This is not the end of story. There are lot of posts about this topic. May be I have to created part-2 for this post. Should I??????????????????????????????????

Link to my former blog post:
Why do I blog-1
Part-2