Ben Reichelt’s Weblog

I read somewhere recently (and of course I can’t recall the link now, otherwise I would cite them) about how corporate “blogging” is becoming popular.  Now this is nothing new, the more current companies realize that blogging can be a great marketing tool and a way to get information out there very quickly.  Along with corporate blogs, there has also been a rise in media companies blogging the news.  My local paper, the Strib, has an entire section devoted to blogs.

For some reason, I’m not drawn to these corporate and media blogs the same way that I am with an individual person’s blog.  Just the fact that you know that anything being written there is filtered and approved by a marketing or PR department really turns me off.  To me, the whole point of a blog is to be able to get an unfiltered, transparent perspective and if thats not what I’m getting, then its not a blog.  Its just another story or opinion piece or marketing propaganda.

I also don’t like that much polish on the blogs that I read.  I want that rough-around-the-edges feel that makes posts seem more real that something that went through an editing process, it makes reading it more fun and authentic, and you know you’re getting the straight dope.  Scoble does this really well, he writes like he talks (I would guess), and you feel like you’re part of a conversation, not just being spoken to.

I’m all about news sites having rss feeds, don’t get me wrong, but theres a difference between having rss feeds and having “bloggers” publishing content.  When I’m reading a blog I have a certain connotation about the information I’m getting, which is vastly different than if I know I’m reading the news.  I hope that these companies and media organizations eventually get off the blogging phenomena and instead stick to publishing their regular content.