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[Summit writes - A Human Voice] 
 
   

Straight talking

For all its fluffiness, The Cluetrain Manifesto, is built on a powerful truth.

People want to communicate with people, it says. To them, organisations sound flat, boring and inhuman. They miss the human voice which is typically open, natural, and uncontrived.

Web logging – or blogging – has put this lesson at the heart of the latest web revolution.

At blogging’s heart are a very simple set of tools. They’re all designed to do one thing: make it incredibly easy to keep a website alive, fresh and up-to-date.

A blogger can update his or her site in seconds, from almost any computer, and without the need for any special software.

Blogosphere

The result has been a momentous flurry of online activity. The early “blogosphere” is a maelstrom of maybe 500,000 sites remarkable for their fresh, opinionated and up-to-date content.

The High Priest of blog has got to be Instapundit, a law professor from Tennessee, seemingly married to his website. He posts 40 or 50 times on a good day and is mostly a “linker” – guiding his fans to the key stories as they emerge on the web.

There are first class “thinkers” about too – the superb Mickey Kaus (now part of the equally wonderful Slate), and two inconsistent iconoclasts from right and left, Andrew Sullivan and Brendan O'Neill.

Network conversations

Blogging is a perfect example of the “networked conversations” Cluetrain predicted. However, these networks still leave organisations puzzled.

“When we have questions we turn to each other for answers,” says Cluetrain. “If you didn’t have such a tight rein on ‘your people’ maybe they’d be among the people we’d turn to.”

 

Perhaps blogging can help solve this problem too. Little by little, the world's ‘big media’ is being converted too. Tom Brew, from MSNBC.com is one fan.

"Blogging is the only real innovation in storytelling that I've seen in my career," he says. "You get the news, you get commentary on the news, you get commentary with a real, personal voice that seems to get readers engaged and excited."

Journey of Discovery

Blogs are also beginning to pierce the thick walls that surround other organisations. Take research chemist, Derek Lowe, whose blog takes you to the heart of drug discovery.

Recently, Derek wrote a short but powerful account of the long distance journey of a research chemist.

"I've never worked on a project that's led to an actual product - it's possible to go an entire career without that happening,” he wrote. “I can think of one, maybe two of my projects in 13 years that have progressed to having a human being put the compound into their mouth.”

I once asked the head of corporate communications at one of the world’s biggest drug companies why they were so hated. After all, their basic “mission” is a fairly laudable one.

“Our arrogance and insecurity” he answered. “And our refusal to be open to people’s legitimate concerns.”

Bush blog?

The Derek Lowes of this world do more to counter this image single-handedly than a thousand tightly-controlled corporate communication initiatives will ever achieve.

And we need more Dereks. How long 'til a Chief Executive of a major multi-national has a blog? Which government minister will boldly blog where no minister has blogged before? When will blogging become a way of communicating for senior civil servants?

And when are we going to hear from the organisational infantry – slogging away in the trenches, but fighting interesting battles and helping win the occasional war?

David Steven | 25/07/02

 

 

[sidelights]

 

 

“When we have questions we turn to each other for answers.

If you didn’t have such a tight rein on ‘your people’ maybe they’d be among the people we’d turn to."

 

 

 

 

 

 

You could read about blogging here or here or here, or for lots of links, here or here or here.

 

 

Blogging is probably best understood through experience.  Aside from those in the text, you could try Ken Layne, Slugger O’Toole, Junius, Tapped, Spinsanity, or Matt Welch. Most have enough links to lose you in the blogosphere for months or years.

 

 

And then you’ll need a blog of your own. Blogger is leader of the pack – though Movable Type has its fans, especially among the more technologically literate. Or check out Google’s rundown of blogging tools.

River Path Associates
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