Are blogs still good places for conversation?

Some people might wonder why blogs have been such a big deal. It's not that they let you share your writings and pictures with friends; you could do that with any old Web site. The real turning point, circa 1998, was the idea to let people comment.

Suddenly, blogs went from being online diaries to being conversation-starters.

But what about today? Sure, some blogs still spark heated debate and commenting frenzies. But the rapid expansion of social media has left us with so many ways to communicate, it can be hard to keep a conversation in one place.

On the off chance I post something interesting here on the blog, someone might post a comment. Or they could talk about it on Twitter, a service that essentially lets you post a brief instant message to the public. Or someone might react on FriendFeed, a site that tells you about anything your friends are posting online. Or maybe the reader will just send me an instant message, or an e-mail, or a message through Facebook... In the time it would take me to list all the options, 25 new social media services would probably be launched.

Another problem is that if you comment on a blog, you have to remember to check back for responses. With all of us reading so many things online, that can be a pretty tall order.

So are blogs losing their revolutionary role as a place for conversation? And if so, should we be sad about that?

I posed the question to the social media addicts on Twitter, and the response was tremendous (better, in fact, than almost any blog post I've ever written, which might tell us something by itself). Check out the litany of great replies after the jump.

The question: Has the conversation aspect of blogging moved off the blog?

1. Michael Krotscheck: Yes. Many people don't have time to keep track of all the blog comments anymore, and have gone to media that offer fast replies.

2. Bill Green: Less moved off of and more like expanded to other things like Facebook, Twitter, etc.

3. Amanda Chapel: I'd ask "Where have conversations gone?" It seems to have all collapsed into social media celebrity shilling.

4. Jason McCay: I don't think so at all. In fact, I think links in twitter increase traffic to a physical post and results in more blog comments.

5. Austin Walne: Blogs have become a place for more in-depth discussion, Twitter has become a place for conversation, the watercooler/breaking news.

6. Jeremy Biser: I feel like the catalyst for conversation still resides on a blog, then it gets expanded through Twitter, FriendFeed and other services

7. TheGirlRiot: Conversation may begin at blogs; the slowness, however, makes other, newer methods more conducive to continuing that conversation.

8. Kelby Carr: Actually I think sometimes it has moved off. In fact, I see people comment here (Twitter) after clicking to read one of my posts.

9. Brandon Morgado: My comments go to wherever I expect to get the most response from the most people. Today that is on twitter.

10. Kelby Carr (again): It can be a little frustrating because it's nice to have the comments on the blog itself, where the "conversation" started.

11. Mojo Denbow: Blog comments = discussion & dialogue. Microblogging = sound bites.

12. Amanda Chapel (again): How's this, "The Web conversationalists ran out of stuff to talk about"?

13. Mack Collier: A good chunk of it has, David.  There's far more social sites/tools available to us now to interact and expand on a blog's posts.

14. Jessica Hagy: You're asking about blog conversations on Twitter, so you've pretty much already answered that one. :)
    • Note from Griner: I'm not one to get blogger-starstruck easily, but HOLY CRAP IT'S JESSICA HAGY!

15. Meg Fowler: If all bloggers were on Twitter or FriendFeed (which isn't nearly the case), then perhaps. Some ends up here (on Twitter) — but comments matter.

16. tomob: Blogs are no more than 5 to 7% of the real conversation. People who aren't "twitterati" talk to each other on forums, newsgroups, web boards

17. Matt Yoho: Blogs have never been great at the "social" aspect of a social web; comments were always second-class citizens. Dialog has moved on.

18. Mojo Denbow (again): Every time content on my blog is posted a link is automagically twittered. The Twitter-to-blog traffic has been outstanding.

19–23. Alan Wolk: Depends on the blog and how techy its readers are. Most of my comments are on the blog. Moving them off is overwhelming.
    People don't have the time to follow FriendFeed and Plurk and Twitter comments, and those are likely from people who'd not post.
    Few blogs have very techy/engaged audiences. Look at Scamp, top adblog in UK, only convo is on blog.
    But for blogs that get 300+ comments on a post (including many newspaper sites) blog is useless for conversation. Too much work.
 But sites with that much input are very rare — the exception, not the norm.

24. American Copywriter: Blogs are storehouses of opinion and insight. But Twitter and FB r more practical places to converse. Each has a role.

25. Alan Wolk (again): Bigger theme: Few blogs generate conversation off the site. I mean we're not that interesting except maybe to our friends.

26. tsutrav: I vote no. In my mind they are still very dif. types of conversations. Current constraints on SM rob some conversations of any depth.

27. Alan Wolk (yet again): Seriously DG, I'm "friends" w/ most of social media crew & can't think of a single "discussion" on Twitter beyond "Check this out."

28. Scott Hepburn: Blog discussions wan, too, though point well taken. Fleeting convos a bad thing? Or the spark for deeper blog convos?

29. Alan Wolk (back for more): One last thought (& then I'll shut up!) Off-blog convo often happens, but with people who are not regular readers of a site.

30. Whatsnext: Conversation has expanded, but Twitter, etc drive comments to my blog. I have more comments than ever.

31. Bradley Kay (sent via Facebook): I think it has. We live in a world of instant gratification and blogs have become too static to satiate our desire for rapid responses feedback. With the proliferation of conversational apps like Twitter, AIM, Facebook, etc, people would rather continue their dialogue with an author in real-time.
    Just look at the way people are responding to your question. I'm sending my response to you through Facebook. Others will likely respond using Twitter or e-mail.

32. Angela Natividad (sent via instant message): Comments were never just an end in themselves. They became truly beneficial in the landscape because people felt like they were a part of some flowering, passionate discourse.
    Now they can do it in real-time.
   

(Back to Griner)
So.....all that said, anyone else have any thoughts? Or did everyone get exhausted before I could even get this blog discussion into the blog?

COOL NOTE: The illustration for this post is actually a graph of The Social Path. Try graphing your blog on this sweet site.

Comments

[tsutrav]

Thanks for posting all these. Some good stuff. I think it's telling that you had to go this extra step just so everyone could see all the replies. Not much of a discussion if everyone is isolated in their SM port of choice. Though I think twebinars and plurkshops are a step in this direction. Thanks again!

[Mark Tosczak]

There are more places for online conversations now -- Facebook, Twitter, etc. But that's not bad, that just means there's more opportunity for more people to share ideas. The Web's magic -- the hyperlink -- is still very much alive in those conversations, and that's the key. Also, you can still do some things in an original blog post (think length, multimedia, etc.) that are harder to do in those other social apps.

One thing, though, is do we need a search engine or something that can connect all the activity around that hyperlink (and around its tinyurl equivalents) together? Plug the permalink for this post into Google or Technorati, at least at this moment, and there's nothing.

Maybe we do need a better way of tracking the distributed conversation. (Or maybe there's a good app that already does this, that doesn't require every user to have an account, and I'm just not aware of it?)