With millions of blogs on the internet, don't blame yourself if you can't keep up with them all. Advertisers are having the same problem. They know that there are substantial audiences who get their news, their humor, their gossip from blogs, but, reaching them has been difficult. Now, a number of companies are starting blog networks to serve up all those consumers in one place. NPR's Robert Smith has the story.
The life of a political blogger can be a lonely one. That the great thing about blogging on your own is ,it's like being a stand-up comic, it's all your show. The bad thing about blogging on your own is it's like being a stand-up comic; it's all your show. Glenn Reynolds, also known as the Instapundit ,says he has always tried to link to a wide range of other bloggers, but he is finding he can’t keep up with them all. So he's becoming part of a network of some of the heavy hitters and political blogging. Pajamas Media,started by Roger Simon, the conglomerate has something that few blogs can tout. 3.5 million dollars in venture capital, and a big business dream.
"By aggregating ourselves together, we sort of want to become the New Yorker-slash- New York times of the blogosphere here ."
And Simon's up- front about the power of a network. It's a model that advertisers can understand.
"You know, we are going to offer advertisers a largest network of viewers with a certain demographic so they can say 'Ah, yes'. Volvo says there are people are all, a lot of these people need to have a nice Volvo, it's safe,etc."
It's an old story. "This is the NBC, the National Broadcasting Company."
The NBC radio network pioneered the form 80 years ago, up until the 1920s radio was pretty amateur fair. Like the modern internet, there were a slew of ideas about how to fund the media, including coin-operated radios. But NBC and the other fledging networks provided the scale to hire the best performers and bring in the big companies in advertising.
Of course radio was expensive and had limited bandwidth. The network concept is still controversial in the internet world. The launch of the Pajama's blog network was widely ridiculed on the web. It initially debuted as open source media until they found out a public radio program had the same title. They had quickly changed the name to Pajama's--- a reference to the insult the bloggers sit around in their pajamas all day. But the most scathing criticism of the new network asked "why bother".
"I think the Internet destroy networks". Jeff Jarvis writes the blog Buzz Machine. "You will make your own network, you'll find the blogs and the podcasts and the vlogs that you like, and that's your network."
Jarvis has been down the conglomerate network road before. He started the magazine Entertainment Weekly before becoming a blogger. Jarvis thinks that even without organized networks there is an opportunity for bloggers to become more savvy about the collective power.
"Advertisers do want to figure you out this world of citizens media. But to buy on blogs today and podcasts and so on is too complicated. So we have to make it easier for advertisers. "
The question is what model would become the dominant form of network on the Web. For instance, the company BlogAds offers many networks to advertisers. You can choose between putting all your ads on military blogs or ones for Republican women or TV blogs.Henry Copeland is the founder.
"Those are the ones the bloggers have created ,um, I mean, bloggers come to us and say,'Hey, I notices a network of New Yorkers.' I'd love to, you know, I'd love to do something like that for my city' ,and we say 'ok, you know, here is the tool, go ahead and do it.'"
These are loose affiliations and the bloggers share the ad revenue. On the other end of the spectrum are commercial blog networks that run top down. Weblogs Inc. has 80 different blogs like Engadget and the Autoblog that centrally owned and controlled and linked to one or another. Shawn Gold is the publisher.
"You know,it's sort of the model of a best sellers or something sells well because it's selling well so the more popular our blogs get, the more popular our network gets, you know, everything started to rise together. "
It's a model that at least one mainstream media company thinks it's profitable.The Webblogs network was recently sold to AOL for reported 25 million dollars. But even the new networks say they have to be careful.In the rush for ad dollars no one wants to kill the one thing that made blog popular in the first place. A passionate voice is saying things that no one else will. Pajama's optional. Robert Smith, NPR News, New York.
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