The common definition of a blog is that it is a short form of the term “weblog”. This is a personal website that features regular updates on an individual””s life, his thoughts or commentary on current events and includes the use of other elements such as graphics or videos. The most recent entries are usually displayed at the top of the page, termed reverse-chronological order.
Before blogs existed, internet users communicated ideas and links with one another via mailing lists, forums, or bulletin board systems. Through means such as this, ongoing conversations could take place in “threads” of almost limitless length. The origin of blog probably can be traced back to these systems on which members posted entries or links that they felt would be of interest to other members.
This allowed individuals to easily share ideas and thoughts with others. The term “weblog” was originally used to refer to the log file of a server and later on, known as a “blog”, but was subsequently expanded to include more personal posts or updates by individuals. Of course, the term now is synonymous with an online journal, laid out in chronological order, which contains its owner””s thoughts, details of daily life and anything he feels might be interesting to others.
It was a long journey from the origin of blog to personal journaling, or blogging as we know it today. Back then in the early 90””s, the earliest online journals did not involve simple click-and-post publishing. Instead, authors and editors had to write code from scratch. Updating a site was not as straightforward then as it is today. Editors often ran the risk of breaking links within the website each time it was updated, thus leaving readers stranded by broken links.
Such frustrating setbacks inspired programmers and website developers to develop their own software that would make it a breeze to publish a personal online journal automatically, which lead to the emergence of the more popular blog-hosting sites available nowadays.
The appeal of sharing your thoughts on a platform that could be had for free was irresistible to the less technically-inclined internet users, leading to the explosive proliferation of blogs today.