Kris in a comment on my blogging of the last session of the Weblog Business Strategies makes a damn fine point:

I find it ironic that the “real webloggers” (whoever that is) reclaim the term “weblog”. If I remember correctly it was the makers of weblog software and other A-list webloggers who diluted the term “weblog” from the beginning. They called every site that was made with weblog software a weblog to prove that weblogs are the next big thing.

So, why is anyone upset that Tony Perkins claims that his AlwaysOn site is a weblog or even a “super-weblog”? Does the phrase “reaping what you sow” have any relevance here?

It sure does. But that’s why at the conference I said that I don’t think this is a semantic issue. Or as Alex Golub writes also in the comments section: “Tell me what /problem/ you are trying to solve by asking that question.” Exactly.

If you really don’t know what weblog is, it’s not hard to explain. You point to some uncontested examples of blogs — say, Dave‘s and Doc‘s — and you say something like, “See? It’s a web site where an individual can talk about what matters to her/him, generally in relatively short bursts, generally every day, and with lots of links.” We can natter over that “definition,” but I’d say that now you know pretty much what people mean by “blog.” And, of course, you acknowledge that individual blogs may not have all of those characteristics, that there are borderline cases, etc. That it’s ambiguous isn’t a criticism of a definition. It’s just how language works; language is necessarily ambiguous, but that’s another story.

At yesterday’s blogging conference, everyone knew what a blog is. We might disagree about whether Slashdot or Drudge should count as a blog, but no one would disagree that Dave and Doc are writing blogs. And fundamentally that’s what “knowing what a blog is” means.

No, the question wasn’t about semantics. It was about politics, about the effect on our connected existence of Tony proclaiming loudly that AO is a weblog. Mixed in was certainly some people’s antipathy towards Tony and AO. (I entered this with no feelings about Tony whatsoever and a with a genuine hope that AO succeeds if only because every business failure hurts the Net.) Those extraneous feelings aside, there’s still a genuine complaint against how AO is using the term.

The part of AO that might be considered bloggy is pretty clearly a commenting or letters-to-the-editor capability. That’s good to see, and people are writing trenchant commentary. But it’s missing some core stuff that’s central to understanding why bloggery is important: Members don’t get a home page where I can go to read what they’ve written today. The “members profile” page doesn’t count even though it has a linked list of previous posts. This matters (to me, anyway) since I think the most important effect of weblogging is that it creates a persistent place on the Web that comes to stand for the person; a blog site is as close as we’ve come to having a Web self.

Tony is obviously a great marketer. Every time he proclaims AlwaysOn as a “super-blog,” he’s having an actual effect on the world. People who go to AlwaysOn thinking that it’s a prime example of a weblog are going to hear interesting voices — good — but are going to miss what to me is the most important aspect of blogging: the creation of a web of Web selves. That objection is political, not semantics.

Now, it wouldn’t take much for AlwaysOn to become truly a “super blog,” i.e., a place that offers and aggregates blogs:

Give every member a blog page where her/his posts are shown. And, what the hell, show them in reverse chronological order. Why not!

Preferably, but not essentially, allow members to customize the look of their AlwaysOn blog page. Keep ’em branded with the AlwaysOn title bar, but allow people to decorate their space.

Fix up the Terms of Use so users not only own their words and are liable for their words, but their words aren’t perpetually licensed for free to AlwaysOn. We just need some qualifying words assuring us that AlwaysOn won’t sell our words without first asking us.

That’s all it would take, I believe, for AlwaysOn to turn itself into what is unarguably a blog provider. Think how having your own blog page at AlwaysOn would increase customer loyalty to the site. Win-win! And all it would take is a smidge of software.

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David Winer is hugging Tony Perkins. Also on the panel: Rebecca Lieb of internet.com and Jason Shellen of Blogger, who are not hugging. This is a panel where the Experts answer our questions.

“Do people blog just to say they’re blogging?” Surprisingly, Rebecca says yes. Jason replies that it takes staying power to blog for a long time.

“What is a blog?” Dave: It’s the style, not the technical features. It’s in the unedited voice of the individual. But even that rule can be broken, e.g., group blogs like BoingBoing. But there’s a long list of best practices.

Jason Shellen: It consists of posts. Harrumph.com.

Rebecca: “A business blog is an unofficial means of addressing a defined agenda.” An individual and honest voice. An open loop.

Tony: He quotes Dave Winer. Dave urges him to give all of AlwaysOn’s members their own blog. Tony says they do, but they’re disagreeing (again) over what a blog is.

Now we’re fighting again over Tony’s use/coopting of the word. The crowd is generally tired of the topic. I’m not, although this is no longer the right place to pursue it. For me, the issue is that we — the Blogosphere — have built something special, post by post, day by day. Tony is misappropriating our work for his own purposes. I have nothing against his purposes — I hope AlwaysOnline succeeds — but having him misuse and abuse the term “blog” makes it harder for us to explain what is special about the world we’ve built together. It harms the growth of blogging. IMO.

Tony wraps up by acknowledging that AlwaysOn isn’t a blog. “You can sense it.” But he wants to help us expand beyond our “cult.” Sure, but Tony should listen about what makes blogs blogs, IMO.

Dave is enlisting Tony in Dave’s project of giving a blog to everyone in New Hampshire in order to affect the 2004 presidential election.

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Lydon was the host and creator of The Connection, a genuinely intelligent talk show on NPR. He’s interested in how blogging fits into the attempt to create a national conversation.

He tells about the best caller into the show. She took various names but settled on “Amber” and took on the most powerful articulate guests. “When she nailed Gore Vidal to the wall, I knew I wanted to meet her.” She turned out to be an illegal immigrant with insight and intelligence and passion. He told Dave Winer about this and Dave said “That’s the blogger.”

Christopher worked for the NY Times for ten years. For him, the fall of Raines is an epochal event. But Jayson Blair is just a tiny bit of the picture. The crisis is really due to the fact that “we’re not talking straight with one another.” And “the encroachment of electronic media.” And, fundamentally, a dissatisfaction with the conversation around Iraq: we were lied to.

“We could put together a 2 hour radio show tomorrow that’s just as interesting and knowledgeable as the NY Times.” “We are being induced to shake off the phony authority of the NY Times.”

But he also wants to complain about BlogWorld: Too techie. Too much quoting and not enough writing. Too rude. Too much hip shooting and ideological response. But it is genuinely open and free and democratic.

To Tony: “We’re talking about free individuals, not about mass commodities that can be packaged and sold.”

How do we aggregate that talent without sitting on it? “We’re in the process of designing a radio broadcast that draws significantly on blog smarts.” How to do it? How often? What time of day? How do you get people to listen? How to make it global?

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Rock Regan, CIO of IT for the State of Connecticut says the Architectural Review Board is composed of 9 different groups. About 40 people are using blogs to capture information, discuss stuff, and make decisions. He wants to use blogs for project management. He wants to capture information by function, not by person. “It’s a critical element of organization.” The government’s motto is “I’m all for progress so long as there’s no change.” Moderator Phil Windley, former CIO of Utah, smiles.

Phil asks how the culture of blogging is affecting organizations. Bill Seitz says managers need to be aware of how their implicit power can “drive honesty underground” by being heavy-handed in how they deal with blogging. Tim Ireland of Bloggerheads says that blogs can make public what otherwise would be lost in email, improving corporate memory.

Paul Perry of Verizon created private spaces for people to post to as their own private journal. This helped ease them into blogging. “People need to be able to post and make mistakes.” And gain their own voice.

Bill finds that encourages structuring ideas into smaller chunks. It makes it easier for people to ask for further explanation.

Phil asks about blogging and KM. Paul Perry chose Tractions as his software because it tracks the links among the blogs. For Paul, KM is the ability to quickly find the best summary or set of ideas. In response to a question from Martin Roell, Paul explains that he allows people to modify the taxonomy of ideas he initiated.

Rather than expecting someone to write up a big report on, say, competitive analysis, Paul encourages people to blog their ideas. That way the report doesn’t go stale in two weeks.

(I had to take a phone call and missed the last ten minutes.)

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Tony Perkins of AlwaysOn is giving a keynote. He’s drawn a whole lot of fire over the past 1.5 days, in his absence, because some people think he’s been claiming to be a champion blogger (through an actual PR person) even though AlwaysOn isn’t actually a blog. I don’t know him and have no opinion. He’s going to talk about why he’s an inappropriate choice as a keynoter and why it’s a great time to be an entrepreneur. Then, why “participatory journalism” can be “leveraged” to do great things. Then, he’s going to talk about the AlwaysOn network’s business model.

“I’m not really a blogger,” he says. But he is a “media entrepreneur.” He started Upside and Red Herring. While he’s a “poseur” in this market (blogging, presumably), “I have never been so excited or had so much fun in my entire professional career” as he’s having with AlwaysOn.

It’s a great time to be an entrepreneur because the initial work of the Internet (the Bubble) did the loss-leader work of creating a market and infrastructure. He built AlwaysOn for $50K in developer time and $150 sw project (“P Machine”). In 1996, it would have cost millions.

He’s done research that confirms that this Internet thing is going to be big with the kids. By 2005, there will be 2B users (half non-PC users), 2B cellphone users. “Wireless is going to be a huge driver.” By the end of 2003, every Sony TV will come with a Net address.

Tony has a set of principles for media start-ups. It’s stuff like “It’s better to bootstrap than go to a board of director meetings” and “Build a community that advertisers care about.” Not a lot new here.

Tony’s “entrepreneurial lightbulbs”: “Voyeurism is good for stickiness.” Open Source means that the guys who are usually interviewed now post their ideas directly. And the “eBayization of Media.”

“Open Source Media” means that members can post comments and do so under their own names. You can get context info about members.

AO makes money by sponsorships and advertisements, and by producing events. Also, paid members receive premier services. Plus a bunch of other stuff.

“So, why am I here? Most importantly, to get feedback because I’m not from the community.” He wants to find partners, to engage with developers over “identity” issues, etc.

Q: Could you quantify the size of the opportunity for bloggers?

A: You could build a network around every community gathered around a subscription.

Q: (Dave Winer) If you’re successful at what you do, how will what you do be like a weblog?

A: I’m giving people a chance to participate.

Dave and Tony go at it, to no avail.

Q: (Halley) What happens when members post stuff that criticizes the site’s sponsors?

A: The sponsors are prepared for that.

A kerfuffle breaks out about whether AlwaysOn is a blog. IMO, the only issue is whether Tony is attempting to coopt the term “blog.”

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This is an illustrious set of panelists.

Denise Howell says there are risks to blogging just as there are to maintaining any web site. People do it anyway “because the price of not being on the Web is just too high.” Blogs are even riskier than static Web pages because there’s greater employee involvement, speedier updates, more interaction and more visiblity. Liabilities include defamation (knowingly publishing something false and harmful) or Corporate Disparagement. It’s not clear, says Denise, how the First Amendment applies. [I thought we repealed that pesky Amendment a couple of years ago.] There’s also the misappropriation of information or the name and likeness of individuals. In general, you ask people permission and set rules and policies. She cites Groove Network’s statement on blogs as a model. “The laws don’t go away,” she says.

John Palfrey, executive director of the Berkman Centere says he’s learned three things from launching the Harvard blogging initiative :1. Be wary of becoming an ISP. He’s found dozens and dozens of definitions in the law about who is an ISP. At least 40 different ways. “The US law is a complete mess in the Internet space.” So, get a lawyer to work it through. 2. Be prepared for take-off. 3. And blogs are good for the Web. John is hugely enthusiastic about blogging but recommends that we be aware of the risks. He also urges people to use Creative Commons licenses.

Catherine Reuben talks about blogging and employee relations. Employers can read the blog of a prospective employee. And they can read — and act on — what an employee writes in her personal blog; the First Amendment restricts the government, but not business. Employees can also be disallowed from blogging that gives away something of value, e.g., the CNN reporter who was also blogging. Employee don’ts: Don’t do it on company time. Don’t reveal your employer. Don’t “fire off stuff you wouldn’t want a potential employee to see.” Don’t automatically sign your confidentiality or “intellectual property” agreements; you have more bargaining power than you think. If you are an analyst, your employer may own what you write. Employers should have a reasonable, clear confidentiality agreement. They should have a clear policy about employee Web sites and blogs. It’s a huge area of legal uncertainty…

Maurice Ringel is a lawyer who did 20 years as a marketing and ad guy. He says a blog may be considered a form of advertising, even if it’s totally unintentional. It’s not yet clear which bodies may enforce regulations against bloggers somehow conceived as advertising.

Arik Hesseldahl is senior editor of Forbes.com. He passes everything he writes through the site’s lawyer. (I got interrupted and missed his comments. Sorry.)

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Dan has posted his conference photos…

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(First of all, the 6th grade jazz band is pretty damn amazing. My son included.)
Moderator David Schnaider is fed up sloppy writing, big egos and people speaking without knowing about the topic. “And that’s why I’m not going to watch the Fox 10 O’Clock News any more.”

Now each of the panelists gets ten minutes to talk.

Jeff Jarvis: “Weblogs are the highest form of audience content” because: 1. We put our names on it; 2. Linking means the cream rises to the top; 3. The interactivity improves quality. Weblogs have advantages over traditional media: more tmely, more variety, highly voiced, great tools, and hugely interactive. Blogs are “the fastest, cheapest publishing tools with the widest distribution ever.” Marketers will figure this out and, if they’re smart, will treat bloggers as “influencers” without asking anyone to hide the relationship.

Elizabeth Spiers of Gawker says her blog gets covered by the media a lot in part because she writes about media and it’s a narcissistic industry. Some of the print gossip columns apparently routinely take stuff from her blog. So, not only is her site better than the print media, she is the source of the news.

Rafat Ali runs PaidContent.org. He is a journalist interest in new ways for e-content to make money. His premise is that weblogs will replace trade web sites: they’re timelier, leaner, and can provide saturation coverage. And, he stresses that the Open Source ethic gives trade weblogs a big advantage. Put together a blog + database + research rep[orts, and you do business, but a blog + nothing is a hobby. And, says Rafat, blogs have killed the newsletter business. [Hell, judging from how often I now bring out my newsletter, JOHO, it’s killed the free newsletter “business.” JOHO lives. But barely.]

Vin Crosbie says the traditional media are still dismissive of blogging. But keeping a journal isn’t a fad; it’s part of human nature, he says. Further, blogging is journalism so long as it’s honest and accurate. His advice to the media is: Let the people with expertise and enthusiasm blog. Do it because it’s a service to your readers and also so you won’t lose traffic to bloggers. It’ll take journalists a few years to figure it out, but they’ll come around.

Question: What will the media landscape be like in 5 years? And which money streams will have shifted?

Jeff says: We don’t know. The audience is spreading out, e.g., we’ve gone from three networks to hundreds. That makes it harder for people to make money. The ad industry will figure out that this is a great opportunity for “targeting.” [All hail Gonzo Marketing.]

Question: What about aggregation?

Jeff: People don’t have time to read everything. “The media need to learn that short isn’t dumb. Short is smart.”

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BusinessWeek Online has posted an article on blogging. I haven’t read it yet.

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I’m going to have to miss the opening session or two of the conference because it’s our 12-year-old’s end-of-school concert and awards ceremony. Looking forward to it.

Meta-blogging: Denise and Heath Row are doing their usual astounding jobs of detailed, comprehensive live blogging. Joi Ito has the best list I’ve seen of conference bloggers. And here‘s an aggregation site that some of the conference bloggers are using, set up by Martin Röll who’s visiting from the Grand Duchy of Luxemburg. (Martin is the first person I’ve ever met from a fictitious country.)

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