I must confess that I have never actually encountered a link blog.. but
It seems to me if you make a blog that is basically just a lot of links, you have more curation powers then with micro blogging or social book marking...
A link blog could be something like a record of some of your online adventures.. and in that way it can tell a story that can be a kind of subtext to the links.. that could be a unique attribute to the link blog..
I think this is really the central issue to all of social media.. it's not a question if anything is good or bad.. but what is it good for.. or what is good for you with whatever it is you're trying to do.
I think a problem with best practices is that they have to do with what's the best practice for doing X.. which assumes a kind of ecological context for which the best practice is a crystallization of both that ecological context, and what folks are collectively trying to do. In this way it's really an expression of statistical norms.. but the ecological context is one of flux.. and what do we say of the unique moment? And it seems to me that.. in some special way.. social media is about the unique moment.
Mark Dykeman
· 1 year ago
All fair points. I guess my thought was if the functionality of a link blog can be duplicated effectively and more efficiently via some other tool, then why not use that? I have a bias towards seeing long form entries in blogs, so I wouldn't find a link blog very exciting, especially when they are basically automated feeds from social bookmarking software.
AdamSinger
· 1 year ago
Twitter/FriendFeed/Digg/Reddit/SU killed the link blog star (imo).
Mark Dykeman
· 1 year ago
Good synopsis.
JayCruz
· 1 year ago
If you mean using a platform like wordpress or blogger to just putting hypertext, then yes, I agree. If your going to do just that, then something like twitter, digg, or delicious would be a better option. But you could be a good "link blogger", as in pointing to things you find online, if you offer some context.
Mark Dykeman
· 1 year ago
Context adds value and it is much preferred to a static list of links.
Ari Herzog
· 1 year ago
Do you consider Wikipedia a link blog?
Mark Dykeman
· 1 year ago
No. In fact, I don't consider Wikipedia to be a blog.
TDavid
· 1 year ago
I don't subscribe to or read any *all* linkdump blogs. Some of the blogs I follow run out lists of unreleated links with a few comments here and there, using that delicious plugin most commonly.
I prefer reading -- and writing -- blog posts with some meat to them. A list of completely unrelated links in a blog post, even with small amount of context added, is usually not very meaty. For readers, the context provided is often too short to be useful. Now a list of related links around a topic is a whole different thing and could be quite useful.
From the author side though, from time to time providing linkdump posts can break up things and provide variety overall to the blog. So these posts are ok here and there. They suck though for SE. How does the SE determine what is relevant on the page in a linkblog post with very little text?
Blogs completely dedicated to linking? I guess maybe if it was something the author wanted for their own use but I don't see many people subscribing. FriendFeed, delicious, et al probably best places these days for that type of regular activity.
Mark Dykeman
· 1 year ago
You bring up an excellent point about how search engines would evaluate links with little description.
All Comments
It seems to me if you make a blog that is basically just a lot of links, you have more curation powers then with micro blogging or social book marking...
A link blog could be something like a record of some of your online adventures.. and in that way it can tell a story that can be a kind of subtext to the links.. that could be a unique attribute to the link blog..
I think this is really the central issue to all of social media.. it's not a question if anything is good or bad.. but what is it good for.. or what is good for you with whatever it is you're trying to do.
I think a problem with best practices is that they have to do with what's the best practice for doing X.. which assumes a kind of ecological context for which the best practice is a crystallization of both that ecological context, and what folks are collectively trying to do. In this way it's really an expression of statistical norms.. but the ecological context is one of flux.. and what do we say of the unique moment? And it seems to me that.. in some special way.. social media is about the unique moment.
I prefer reading -- and writing -- blog posts with some meat to them. A list of completely unrelated links in a blog post, even with small amount of context added, is usually not very meaty. For readers, the context provided is often too short to be useful. Now a list of related links around a topic is a whole different thing and could be quite useful.
From the author side though, from time to time providing linkdump posts can break up things and provide variety overall to the blog. So these posts are ok here and there. They suck though for SE. How does the SE determine what is relevant on the page in a linkblog post with very little text?
Blogs completely dedicated to linking? I guess maybe if it was something the author wanted for their own use but I don't see many people subscribing. FriendFeed, delicious, et al probably best places these days for that type of regular activity.