What is a weblog?

With as many definitions as people who define them, most people agree a weblog or a “blog” as it is also known, is an online diary or journal where people write about any topic in which they have an interest and make this available for others to read via the Internet. Weblogs have also been described as personal websites with a much simpler means to add and post new material. Blogs can also provide the ability for others to comment on what has been written.

What is the difference between a weblog and a message board, or online chat?

Similar to a weblog in that they provide a forum for people to post their thoughts online, message boards tend to be more conversational, with hundreds or even thousands of people posting their thoughts, raising questions and responding to one another. Message boards also tend to be focused on a single subject of common interest to all of the people writing on the board. For example, a message board may focus on a specific model of car, or music group. Similar to message boards, online chat provides a more instantaneous conversation between and among people, again typically about a single topic of common interest. Weblogs, on the other hand, usually have a single primary poster, can cover a variety of topics and tend to have fewer other people posting their opinions.

How long have weblogs been around?

Weblogs have been an Internet vision for years. Inventors of the Internet like Tim Berners-Lee had envisioned the “read/write” Internet since its inception. It wasn’t until 1999 that the tools were launched that made “blogging” practical. It was at that time that pioneers like Dave Winer, founder of Userland, and Meg Hourihan of Pyra Labs launched the first software products that made “blogs” available to the masses.

What gets discussed in a weblog?

The subjects of blogs are as varied as the people who write them. Most people discuss the ongoing events of their lives in their blogs, while others use blogging as a medium to express their opinions about specific topics and focus all of the writing on this subject. For example, many people talk about their school, work, relationships, vacations and day to day activities, while others use it as a forum to express their opinions on politics, music, products, technology and emerging trends.

Who blogs?

Everyone blogs. While the earliest adopters of blogging were technologists searching for a simpler method of expressing their opinions through the Internet, weblogs were quickly adopted by those wishing to make their political opinions and observations available to others. Shortly after the adoption by technologists and politicos, younger Internet users rapidly began adopting weblogs as a journal or diary to share with others; however, today people of all ages and technological abilities have adopted and use weblogs. For example, a new mother might adopt blogs as a convenient and time-saving way to provide updates to friends and family on developments with her new child without having to answer tens of emails she receives everyday.

How many blogs are there?

Estimates place weblogs as high as 10 million by the end of 2004. Umbria Communications draws its information from over 3.5 million weblogs, which grows by 100,000 new weblogs per week.

Umbria Communications turns the unsolicited buzz of the Internet into actionable market research. Using proprietary natural language processing and machine learning technologies, Umbria analyzes the who, what and why of online opinion to provide deep insight into the buzz about companies, products, people and topics of interest. Umbria analyzes data from millions of public weblogs and other opinion sources of the online community on a daily basis. Umbria's client list includes market leading brands and Fortune 1000 companies.

The technology that Umbria Communications' uses to determine demographics, the topics being discussed and the perspectives being provided is a new application of linguistic analysis. This technology looks at a wide range of indicators, including clusters of words, parts-of-speech and recurring terms and the context in which those terms are used, to make its determinations. All market research has a margin of error dependent upon the type of analysis being conducted. Likewise, Umbria Communications' analysis of weblogs and other online opinion sources is limited to the perspectives of the pool of individuals who have gone online to offer opinions on the election and the candidates.

In addition to the data provided throughout this site, Umbria's capabilities include deeper demographic and topical analysis, which yield a more thorough assessment of the election. In addition to the Presidential election, Senatorial and other significant races provide abundant data for similar analysis. Umbria Communications research includes consumer products (from beer and ice cream to household products to cellular phones and PDA's), entertainment, studies of what's hot and what's not for different demographic segments (i.e. Gen Y) and custom analysis of all forms of online discussion.

To learn more please visit Umbria Communications.

How can you tell what someone is talking about?

Umbria Communications uses a combination of approaches to understand what is being discussed in weblogs. Some of the methods used by Umbria include approaches used by traditional search engines; however, Umbria takes its analysis further to insure the text it identifies directly relates to the topic of interest. By way of example, compare the following two sentences:

1. “I went to Dairy Queen yesterday to have a blizzard.”
2. “I got stuck in a blizzard yesterday on my way to Dairy Queen.”

If you are interested in the Dairy Queen Blizzard, only sentence 1 is of interest, however, many traditional keyword based search approaches may identify both sentences of equal importance. Umbria’s technology analyzes the entire sentence instead of just keywords to insure only relevant comments are included in the topics it identifies.

How do I create a weblog?

Anyone with access to the Internet can create a blog in minutes. There are several weblog hosting services available online today, most of which provide their blog services for free. Some of the more popular weblog hosting services are Blogger, Live Journal and Diaryland.

Setting up and posting to a weblog is easy and it’s a great way to air your thoughts and opinions with others.