A little more about blogs…. April 30, 2008

I assume there haven’t been any problems getting set up in Bloglines/Google Reader and subscribing to our blogs. Please let me know if you need help!!!

Expanding our reading list…..

In my experience, word of mouth has been the most interesting way to discover more blogs (reading one person’s blog often leads you to others). Many blogs have a “blogroll” on a sidebar that links to the blogs they enjoy reading.  Google Reader has also recently introduced a new “Top Recommendations” (upper right hand corner – green box) that’s made some pretty decent suggestions to me based on what I’m already subscribed to.

Here is a list of some of the blogs I read regularly….

Otherwise– there are two popular ways to finding new blogs to read.

Technorati (this link is to their Advanced Search — scoot to bottom to search the blog directory). From their “About” page:

Technorati is the recognized authority on what’s happening on the World Live
Web, right now. The Live Web is the dynamic and always-updating portion of the
Web. We search, surface, and organize blogs and the other forms of independent,
user-generated content (photos, videos, voting, etc.) increasingly referred to
as “citizen media.”

Google Blog Search – okay, this is pretty much what it sounds like. From their FAQ page:

Blog Search is Google search technology focused on blogs. Google is a
strong believer in the self-publishing phenomenon represented by blogging, and
we hope Blog Search will help our users to explore the blogging universe more
effectively, and perhaps inspire many to join the revolution themselves. Whether
you’re looking for Harry Potter reviews, political commentary, summer salad
recipes or anything else, Blog Search enables you to find out what people are
saying on any subject of your choice.

So the above are two possible ways to search out blogs on a subject.

Activities:

1. Add a “Tacoman” blog to your subscriptions and a few more that catch your eye (hint: “Savage Chickens” and stuff in the Education category) from my list above.
2. Search for blogs about education, community colleges or a personal hobby you enjoy using the tools above.
3. Add some blogs to your Bloglines or Google Reader accounts.
4. Post to your own blog info about a blog you think looks interesting