||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Sam Smith
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL'S claim that this is the tenth anniversary of
the blog - as well as some of the critical reaction to the story - led
us to our archives to find what we could about our role in this tale.
We've tried to avoid the word blog - preferring to call ourselves an
online journal - but the phrase has a ubiquity one can't duck.
The Wall Street Journal claimed, "We are approaching a decade since the
first blogger -- regarded by many to be Jorn Barger -- began his
business of hunting and gathering links to items that tickled his fancy,
to which he appended some of his own commentary. On Dec. 23, 1997, on
his site, Robot Wisdom, Mr. Barger wrote: 'I decided to start my own
webpage logging the best stuff I find as I surf, on a daily basis,' and
the Oxford English Dictionary regards this as the primordial root of the
word 'weblog.'
"The dating of the 10th anniversary of blogs, and the ascription of
primacy to the first blogger, are imperfect exercises. Others, such as
David Winer, who blogged with Scripting News, and Cameron Barrett, who
started CamWorld, were alongside the polemical Mr. Barger in the advance
guard. And before them there were "proto-blogs," embryonic indications
of the online profusion that was to follow. But by widespread consensus,
1997 is a reasonable point at which to mark the emergence of the blog as
a distinct life-form."
While we refer to Barger as the sainted Jorn Barger - he has been
repeatedly kind to this journal over the years - the WSJ has got things
somewhat mixed up. It is certainly true that Barger blessed or cursed us
with the word blog, but whatever you called it, something was already
underway, including at the Progressive Review. As evidence, we would
quote from the very issue cited by the WSJ: Barger's December 23, 1997
Robot Wisdom WebLog in which he writes:
"There's a new issue of the Progressive Review, one of the few leftwing
sources that's vigorously anti-Clinton. . . The lead story this week is
Judge Lamberth's condemnation of White House lies about the healthcare
taskforce in 1993. Its editor Sam Smith also offers a nice fantasy of
what a real newspaper should be, USA Tomorrow . . ."
Barger's contribution was not just one of nomenclature, but of gracing
the Web with an eclectic spirit and curiosity, tapping its holistic
wonders and happily mixing technology, politics, literature, philosophy
and rants. In musical terms, Barger showed us how to swing.
A few examples from that last week of December 1997 illustrates the
point (the copious links are not included)
- This Day in Joyce History. . . On this date in 1891, Dante Riordan
left the Joyce household after the Xmas fight depicted in Portrait. In
?1893 the fictional Rudy Bloom was born. In 1916, Portrait was published
by Huebsch. In 1931, John S. Joyce died. In ?1953 John Kidd was born.
- Two of the most readable computer journalists-- John Dvorak and Jerry
Pournelle-- are about to launch a Siskel/Ebert-style weekly debate site,
using 'wallet' technology to charge a dime a week. . .
- Gorillas make gorgeous representational art. . .
- Email from Frankie? TV.Com claims Frank Sinatra will sometimes answer
friendly email. The Sinatra Family site is endearingly naif. . .
- A couple of x-rated essays at Salon: Susie Bright's very sweet
appreciation of the Pam Anderson/ Tommy Lee bootleg sex video
- Sixties icon Kerry Thornley, intimate of Lee Harvey Oswald and Jim
Garrison and Robert Anton Wilson, and author of the Principia Discordia
is in poor health, and fans are encouraged to order a copy of PD
straight from the source, autographed on request.
- The mass media's undeclared war against the Net is nowhere clearer
than in their assaults against Ian Goddard's TWA800 website. CNN has
baldly falsified a report that Goddard recanted his site as a hoax. . .
- How has the Newt Right so successfully blindsided the progressive
Left? A dryish analysis in The Nation argues that we don't lack the
funds, but we're spending them with self-defeating unfocus. . .
- I am having a fear of modern business practices: A fine culture critic
named Tom Frank (not to be confused with Troll Mennie) explores Fast
Company, the bastard spawn of Wired and Forbes. . .
- Sweden's Crown Princess Victoria (age 20) has been elected Swede of
the Year by the evening paper Expressen. Last month it was announced
that she's suffering from an eating disorder. . .
- Garrison Keillor, quoted on newsgroup misc.activism.progressive:
"We're in the clutches of a bunch of folks trying to turn the U.S. into
a third world country. Two hundred billionaires, and 260 million poor
people. And they haven't done enough damage yet to be beaten."
Duncan Riley offers this critique of the WSJ article:
|||| According to my history of blogging (still No. 3 on Google BTW, and
heavily researched at the time) blogging turned 11 on January 10, the
date in which the first credited blogger (according to Wikipedia as
well) Justin Hall commences writing an online journal with dated daily
entries, although each daily post is linked through an index page. On
the journal he writes "Some days, before I go to bed, I think about my
day, and how it meshed with my life, and I write a little about what
learned me." In February Dave Winer follows up with a weblog that
chronicles the 24 Hours of Democracy Project. Winer has often claimed
that he was the first blogger, I've long disagreed but whether it was
Hall or Winer is a moot point: both were blogging in 1996. . . ||||
According to Wikipedia, "A blog (a portmanteau of web log) is a website
where entries are written in chronological order and displayed in
reverse chronological order. 'Blog' can also be used as a verb, meaning
to maintain or add content to a blog. Blogs provide commentary or news
on a particular subject such as food, politics, or local news; some
function as more personal online diaries. A typical blog combines text,
images, and links to other blogs, web pages, and other media related to
its topic.
At least as early as 1993, the Progressive Review was sending a faxed
blog-like substance to our media list as a supplement to the print
edition. The earliest mention of an online edition that we could find
comes from the August 1994 edition: "If you have an Internet address,
send it to us on a postcard or to ssmith@igc.org and we will add you to
our Peacenet hotline mailing list. You can also find us at alt.activism
and alt.politics.clinton. Sorry, offer not good for networks that carry
e-mail charges"
There then followed a series of blog-like entries.
But none of that really counts because it wasn't on the Worldwide Web.
But by June 1995, the Progressive Review was on the web, where only
about 20,000 other websites existed worldwide. We announced it like
this:
"The Review now has a site on the World Wide Web. Pay us a visit at:
http://emporium.turnpike.net/P/ProRev/ F Here is some of what you'll
find: The Crash of America: How this country's elite ruined the economy,
fouled the environment and left Newt Gingrich in charge. From the March
1995 issue. The fully informed jury movement: The right of juries to
judge both the law and the fact dates back to the trials of William Penn
and Peter Zenger. . ."
Still not bloggish, as we initially only posted longer articles. But
within a few months - we were promising that "The Progressive Review
On-Line Report is found on the Web" and our quasi-blogging had begun.
While we weren't the earliest we were certainly in same 'hood and we may
hold some sort of record for consistency. We are still brought to you by
Turnpike and we are still using Adobe Page Mill to post our non-blog
pages. A year or two ago we ran into an Adobe sales rep at Best Buy and
mentioned our loyalty, saying that "we still love it." She looked quite
cross and said, "That's what a lot of people say."
The Web would come to value style over substance in design and
conventional loyalty over free thinking in politics. But, inspired by a
few like Jorn Borger, we have tried to keep our layout simple and our
thoughts complex. In the game of Internet high-low poker, we went low
and it doesn't seem to have a hurt a bit.
Thanks for sticking around.
http://www.duncanriley.com/2007/07/15/wall-street-journal-
tries-to-re-write-blogging-history/
http://www.robotwisdom.com/log1997m12.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blog
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Sam Smith
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL'S claim that this is the tenth anniversary of
the blog - as well as some of the critical reaction to the story - led
us to our archives to find what we could about our role in this tale.
We've tried to avoid the word blog - preferring to call ourselves an
online journal - but the phrase has a ubiquity one can't duck.
The Wall Street Journal claimed, "We are approaching a decade since the
first blogger -- regarded by many to be Jorn Barger -- began his
business of hunting and gathering links to items that tickled his fancy,
to which he appended some of his own commentary. On Dec. 23, 1997, on
his site, Robot Wisdom, Mr. Barger wrote: 'I decided to start my own
webpage logging the best stuff I find as I surf, on a daily basis,' and
the Oxford English Dictionary regards this as the primordial root of the
word 'weblog.'
"The dating of the 10th anniversary of blogs, and the ascription of
primacy to the first blogger, are imperfect exercises. Others, such as
David Winer, who blogged with Scripting News, and Cameron Barrett, who
started CamWorld, were alongside the polemical Mr. Barger in the advance
guard. And before them there were "proto-blogs," embryonic indications
of the online profusion that was to follow. But by widespread consensus,
1997 is a reasonable point at which to mark the emergence of the blog as
a distinct life-form."
While we refer to Barger as the sainted Jorn Barger - he has been
repeatedly kind to this journal over the years - the WSJ has got things
somewhat mixed up. It is certainly true that Barger blessed or cursed us
with the word blog, but whatever you called it, something was already
underway, including at the Progressive Review. As evidence, we would
quote from the very issue cited by the WSJ: Barger's December 23, 1997
Robot Wisdom WebLog in which he writes:
"There's a new issue of the Progressive Review, one of the few leftwing
sources that's vigorously anti-Clinton. . . The lead story this week is
Judge Lamberth's condemnation of White House lies about the healthcare
taskforce in 1993. Its editor Sam Smith also offers a nice fantasy of
what a real newspaper should be, USA Tomorrow . . ."
Barger's contribution was not just one of nomenclature, but of gracing
the Web with an eclectic spirit and curiosity, tapping its holistic
wonders and happily mixing technology, politics, literature, philosophy
and rants. In musical terms, Barger showed us how to swing.
A few examples from that last week of December 1997 illustrates the
point (the copious links are not included)
- This Day in Joyce History. . . On this date in 1891, Dante Riordan
left the Joyce household after the Xmas fight depicted in Portrait. In
?1893 the fictional Rudy Bloom was born. In 1916, Portrait was published
by Huebsch. In 1931, John S. Joyce died. In ?1953 John Kidd was born.
- Two of the most readable computer journalists-- John Dvorak and Jerry
Pournelle-- are about to launch a Siskel/Ebert-style weekly debate site,
using 'wallet' technology to charge a dime a week. . .
- Gorillas make gorgeous representational art. . .
- Email from Frankie? TV.Com claims Frank Sinatra will sometimes answer
friendly email. The Sinatra Family site is endearingly naif. . .
- A couple of x-rated essays at Salon: Susie Bright's very sweet
appreciation of the Pam Anderson/ Tommy Lee bootleg sex video
- Sixties icon Kerry Thornley, intimate of Lee Harvey Oswald and Jim
Garrison and Robert Anton Wilson, and author of the Principia Discordia
is in poor health, and fans are encouraged to order a copy of PD
straight from the source, autographed on request.
- The mass media's undeclared war against the Net is nowhere clearer
than in their assaults against Ian Goddard's TWA800 website. CNN has
baldly falsified a report that Goddard recanted his site as a hoax. . .
- How has the Newt Right so successfully blindsided the progressive
Left? A dryish analysis in The Nation argues that we don't lack the
funds, but we're spending them with self-defeating unfocus. . .
- I am having a fear of modern business practices: A fine culture critic
named Tom Frank (not to be confused with Troll Mennie) explores Fast
Company, the bastard spawn of Wired and Forbes. . .
- Sweden's Crown Princess Victoria (age 20) has been elected Swede of
the Year by the evening paper Expressen. Last month it was announced
that she's suffering from an eating disorder. . .
- Garrison Keillor, quoted on newsgroup misc.activism.progressive:
"We're in the clutches of a bunch of folks trying to turn the U.S. into
a third world country. Two hundred billionaires, and 260 million poor
people. And they haven't done enough damage yet to be beaten."
Duncan Riley offers this critique of the WSJ article:
|||| According to my history of blogging (still No. 3 on Google BTW, and
heavily researched at the time) blogging turned 11 on January 10, the
date in which the first credited blogger (according to Wikipedia as
well) Justin Hall commences writing an online journal with dated daily
entries, although each daily post is linked through an index page. On
the journal he writes "Some days, before I go to bed, I think about my
day, and how it meshed with my life, and I write a little about what
learned me." In February Dave Winer follows up with a weblog that
chronicles the 24 Hours of Democracy Project. Winer has often claimed
that he was the first blogger, I've long disagreed but whether it was
Hall or Winer is a moot point: both were blogging in 1996. . . ||||
According to Wikipedia, "A blog (a portmanteau of web log) is a website
where entries are written in chronological order and displayed in
reverse chronological order. 'Blog' can also be used as a verb, meaning
to maintain or add content to a blog. Blogs provide commentary or news
on a particular subject such as food, politics, or local news; some
function as more personal online diaries. A typical blog combines text,
images, and links to other blogs, web pages, and other media related to
its topic.
At least as early as 1993, the Progressive Review was sending a faxed
blog-like substance to our media list as a supplement to the print
edition. The earliest mention of an online edition that we could find
comes from the August 1994 edition: "If you have an Internet address,
send it to us on a postcard or to ssmith@igc.org and we will add you to
our Peacenet hotline mailing list. You can also find us at alt.activism
and alt.politics.clinton. Sorry, offer not good for networks that carry
e-mail charges"
There then followed a series of blog-like entries.
But none of that really counts because it wasn't on the Worldwide Web.
But by June 1995, the Progressive Review was on the web, where only
about 20,000 other websites existed worldwide. We announced it like
this:
"The Review now has a site on the World Wide Web. Pay us a visit at:
http://emporium.turnpike.net/P/ProRev/ F Here is some of what you'll
find: The Crash of America: How this country's elite ruined the economy,
fouled the environment and left Newt Gingrich in charge. From the March
1995 issue. The fully informed jury movement: The right of juries to
judge both the law and the fact dates back to the trials of William Penn
and Peter Zenger. . ."
Still not bloggish, as we initially only posted longer articles. But
within a few months - we were promising that "The Progressive Review
On-Line Report is found on the Web" and our quasi-blogging had begun.
While we weren't the earliest we were certainly in same 'hood and we may
hold some sort of record for consistency. We are still brought to you by
Turnpike and we are still using Adobe Page Mill to post our non-blog
pages. A year or two ago we ran into an Adobe sales rep at Best Buy and
mentioned our loyalty, saying that "we still love it." She looked quite
cross and said, "That's what a lot of people say."
The Web would come to value style over substance in design and
conventional loyalty over free thinking in politics. But, inspired by a
few like Jorn Borger, we have tried to keep our layout simple and our
thoughts complex. In the game of Internet high-low poker, we went low
and it doesn't seem to have a hurt a bit.
Thanks for sticking around.
http://www.duncanriley.com/2007/07/15/wall-street-journal-
tries-to-re-write-blogging-history/
http://www.robotwisdom.com/log1997m12.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blog
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
No comments:
Post a Comment