Glenn Reynolds on the Difference Between Good and Bad Weblogs
Dave Aiello wrote, "On Tech Central Station, Glenn Reynolds talks about what he thinks are the key differentiators between good and bad weblogs. In short, he thinks that good weblogs have personal voice and rapid response times. By personal voice, I think he means that most articles on the site are written in first person."
"Reynolds goes on to talk about the typical differences between weblogs written with personal voice and those written with institutional voice, and why personal voice may be a better choice for weblogs. He sees a direct relationship between the use of personal voice and the speed at which new content is posted to a weblog."
"He seems to be getting at the sense of ownership that an individual has in a weblog written in personal voice. However, it's hard to say that group weblogs like Slashdot and Marketing Fix are less timely, simply because they are not written by an individual."
"Some business people think that their entire web sites must be written in institutional voice. At CTDATA, we have tried to mix institutional voice with personal voice, and we have achieved some success. Strongly opinionated articles on our website are often written in personal voice, so that it's clear that these are the opinions of one person. Other articles are written in institutional voice, generally because they are more news-oriented. In the future, we intend to deepen this distinction by creating personal weblogs for some of our employees."
"It's important to understand that either approach is fine as long as there is some consistency to the style of the site. However, the more weblog-oriented the overall site is, the more likely it is to be written predominantly in personal voice."