Use The Web: Why Paul Boutin Wants You To "Kill Your Blog"

Paul Boutin’s article in WIRED magazine this month suggests that blogging in the age of Twitter and other such services is antiquated and pointless. The “blogosphere”, he says, has become overly saturated with cut-rate journalists and underground marketing campaigns that have effectively drowned out the authentic voices that originally defined the movement. Utilizing services like Facebook, Flickr, and Twitter, where you can specifically tailor your audience to what you provide, thus getting more return for your effort, is a far more effective use of your time and energy.  Plus you won’t have to deal with the legions of hecklers out there trolling around just looking for things to hate.

There just might be some truth to what Boutin is saying. Notable bloggers like Jason Calicanis have abandoned their blogs and (in some cases) Twitter feeds all together, retreating to the safety of email lists, sending out their opinions in a much more private, direct way to those who genuinely want to hear/read them. The connection, Jason says, is far more direct and meaningful.

Trends tend to move in a cyclical fashion and it certainly holds that what is once on top has to spend some time on the bottom before coming back around again. This may be the case with blogging. I know that, in my personal experience, the connections I have formed through Twitter, Facebook, and Flickr feeds are targeted to those people who have specifically made an effort to follow what I do. The other beauty of these systems is the brevity which they require (I am sure some of you are agreeing with them by this point in my post), as Paul artfully demonstrates in this Twitter-style summation of his point:

“Kill yr blog. 2004 over. Google won’t find you. Too much cruft from HuffPo, NYT. Commenters are tards. C u on Facebook?”

By cutting down the number of people I am disseminating my information to I am, effectively, using a rifle, not a shotgun and choosing quality over quantity. My blog is becoming almost ancillary, providing a place for my readership to go when they want to look a little bit deeper into something I have linked to or talked about on one of my feeds, rather than being at the center of my web presence. Who knows, maybe I too will start sending out a weekly email update specifically tailored to a niche community of loyal readers.

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What do you guys think? Is blogging dead or dying? Is this the natural trend cycle taking running its reactionary course or is there something to this idea of direct connections with a smaller audience being more meaningful?

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NOTE: Boutin’s article originally appeared in the November Issue of WIRED under the title “Kill Your Blog.” They changed it online. I am also aware of the irony of posting about this subject on a blog.