An article by this week’s New York Times (“Blogs Falling in an Empty Forest “) offers some very interesting statistics on what would appear to be a crash in blog usage, indicating:

“According to a 2008 survey by Technorati, which runs a search engine for blogs, only 7.4 million out of the 133 million blogs the company tracks had been updated in the past 120 days. That translates to 95 percent of blogs being essentially abandoned, left to lie fallow on the Web, where they become public remnants of a dream — or at least an ambition — unfulfilled.”

Looking past the seeming sense of perverse satisfaction the author takes in documenting the fall from grace of the blog (and the fact this post is oddly categorised in the “Fashion and Style” section of all places), these stats do point to a very interesting trend that I’d like to explore for a moment. A 95% percent neglect ratio is quite substantial after all.

First and foremost, most people have a preferred means of communication, whether they realise it or nor; blogs aren’t for everyone.  It’s only through trying out a new medium that you can establish whether it works for you or not.  I’ve realised I hate discussion forums.  Does my dislike of forums discount the value and efficacy of the entire medium?  No it doesn’t.  It’s just my preference.  Likewise this vertical downward decent in blogging does nothing to diminish the relative value of the medium (good or bad), it only paints the picture of usage trends.

Secondly the blog is just the tip of a much larger iceberg of participatory digital culture.  For new bloggers the presence and nature of this dynamic or landscape is generally unclear and invisible – and yet nonetheless a critical component.  Cultivation of interaction, reciprocity, readership, comments, and networks in digital culture requires engagement with the culture.  Without it bloggers can quickly begin to feel as though their efforts are pointless, and their musings are taking place in a bubble or echo chamber.  With many of the 133 million blogs created during a period when the nature of digital culture was only just being identified – let alone understood – it’s not surprising that many fell prey to the silence.  Ultimately it is indicative of the Hype Cycle, and it’s a natural occurrence.

The Hype Cycle

[Image cc licensed flickr photo shared by Jinho.Jung] More than anything else, the 95% statistic is indicative of the hype cycle, characterised by 5 distinct stages – Technology Trigger, Peak of Inflated Expectations, Trough of Disillusionment, Slope of Enlightenment, and Plateau of Productivity.

Pretty clearly blogs are now in the Trough of Disillusionment phase, and the sentiment of the NYT’s article echoes this quite clearly.  However it’s important to consider the origins of the trough and its place within the larger cycle.

As Wikipedia describes (The Hype Cycle): “Technologies enter the “trough of disillusionment” because they fail to meet expectations and quickly become unfashionable. Consequently, the press usually abandons the topic and the technology.”

Considering the last portion of the description – the idea that “the press usually abandons the topic and the technology,” the Time’s article could be seen as another indicator of the blog’s current status in the Trough of Disillusionment.

The stories the article uses to highlight the crash in usage are yet another example, citing failed expectations, null financial gain, eroded dreams of readership and comments or just lack of interest as causes for the shelving of blogs  saying “many people start blogs with lofty aspirations.”

Essentially, their experiences did not stack up to what they’d wanted or assumed they’d be.  This is a symptom of early adoption, where the role and purpose of a technology is not clearly understood, and user assumptions and expectations are frequently misaligned with reality.  As a result interest in the tech drops off, when people realise the tool isn’t what they thought it would be after all.

At this point it would be easy enough – as the Times has done – to discount and discard the notion of blogs entirely.  Put a nail in the coffin; stick a fork in her, she’s done.  Yet doing so would ignore the final two stages of the Hype Cycle.  As the Wikipedia article continues:

“Slope of Enlightenment” — Although the press may have stopped covering the technology, some businesses continue through the “slope of enlightenment” and experiment to understand the benefits and practical application of the technology.

“Plateau of Productivity” — A technology reaches the “plateau of productivity” as the benefits of it become widely demonstrated and accepted. The technology becomes increasingly stable and evolves in second and third generations. The final height of the plateau varies according to whether the technology is broadly applicable or benefits only a niche market.

Although the Wikipedia article (and the notion of the Hype Cycle more specifically) is geared towards adoption in the commercial sphere, it certainly applies to user adoptions of technologies as well.  In the realm of social media this would include negotiation of use and meaning of the technologies as well as innovations in the tools themselves.  Participatory culture is as much (if not more) about the wider human and social elements than the technology, so the evolutions that are taking place in the life-cycle are still emerging and maturing.

Technology Adoption Lifecycle

At this stage introducing another theory regarding the Technology Adoption Lifecycle, is quite relevant.  As I discussed some time ago:

“The technology adoption lifecycle model describes the adoption or acceptance of a new product or innovation, according to the demographic and psychological characteristics of defined adopter groups. The process of adoption over time is typically illustrated as a classical normal distribution or “bell curve.” The model indicates that the first group of people to use a new product is called “innovators,” followed by “early adopters.” Next come the early and late majority, and the last group to eventually adopt a product are called “laggards.” (Wikipedia, Technology Adoption Lifecycle)

The statistics cited in the Times article are almost certainly from 2008 Technorati’s State of the Blogosphere report, which lists 133 million blogs indexed by Technorati since 2002.  Looking at the same report from 2007, Technorati indicated they were “tracking over 70 million weblogs.” That’s a monumental increase of 63 million blogs in a year between 2007 and 2008 – or 47%.  Looking at the overall trends in blogging – depicted in graphical form here – it’s clear the uptake of blogs didn’t begin to skyrocked until roughly November of 2005.

In effect the vast majority of blogs have been created in the last 5 years, with nearly half created in the last two years.

Comparing that jump in usage to the Roger’s Bell Curve included above, you could argue that we are still in the Early Majority section.  If this is true, and we’ve yet to see the spike from the Late Majority section, in all likelihood, the adoption of blogs will continue.

Pioneers, Settlers and Colonists

Looking at this from another perspective, Jeremiah Owyang from Web Strategy wrote some time ago (“Social Media Early Adopters: Pioneers, Settlers, and Colonists“) of a three-category system of adoption, that included Pioneers, Settlers and Colonists.

He describes each category as follows:

“Pioneers
Obsessed and enamored with the technology, this individual is always adopting the latest social technologies. This individual is fickle with tools, won’t establish loyalty to websites, may move when they see colonists adopt the tool.

Example: Often experimenting with products in their beta stage, this person will quickly move on to the next tool as fast as adopting the second.

Settlers
These second generation adopters look for key market or network indicators before adopting a new technology. This person is less enamored with the new technology, and more interested in the value that it provides.

Example: They may trial tools after seeing several people in their network mention or trial the tool, and may adopt after a beta or trial period is over.

Colonists
Colonists are the mainstream adopters, they are often our parents, non-techies, and the everyday people we meet. They adopt these tools due not because of an internal desire to stay cutting edge, but often because several people around them make it an attractive destination and the they see the utility to the communication. They are not late adopters.

Example:

Joins Facebook because colleagues, family, and friends are using it.”

The 1% Rule

Another important concept in online interaction is the 1% Rule of content creation.  As The Guardian describes (What is the 1% Rule):

“It’s an emerging rule of thumb that suggests that if you get a group of 100 people online then one will create content, 10 will “interact” with it (commenting or offering improvements) and the other 89 will just view it.”

This rule can be seen in many different online contexts, from discussion forums, to video hosting versus viewing, to active versus inactive Twitter accounts.  Considering all this then, the statistic that only 5% of the 133 million blogs are currently active puts the trend in blogging within what is being increasingly seen as normal usage trends.

[Mental note: cite evidence and expand on types of participation.]

Implications and Analysis

In the context of the Times’ article, each of the accounts they included could be categorised in the Pioneers category, including the bleeding-edge, or cutting edge users who adopt a technology while the wider social or usage implications are still being negotiated.

With many more conservative institutions, such as universities and newspapers, only just beginning to explore the use of blogs we could once again argue we are in cusp between Settlers and Colonists in Owyang’s model, or the cusp between Early Majority and Late Majority on the Rogers Bell-Curve model.

The point of all this is that this crash in usage, the accounts of those who have abandoned the medium, even the mainstream article that documents the trends, are all indicative of a natural progression of technological usage, which is not unique to the blog.  Importantly it is also just one phase in the ongoing evolution of usage.  To paraphrase the addage “rumors of the death of blogging have been seriously exaggerated.”