Weblogs

Stay tuned the interbiznet for more glimpses of the future.

Weblog Job Boards

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(September 15, 2000) The web decentralizes, flattens and redistributes. It doesn't make consolidated, spectrum wide brands. It rewards small and punishes big. It roots out arrogance. It keeps changing. It wants users to create. It doesn't create users.

We're huge Dave Winer fans. We've been reading and circulating his "Scripting News/ DaveNet" for six years now. (Take a look at some reader profiles). Dave is always running ahead of the curve. If you want to see where the web is headed, it's useful to follow his tracks. As ornery as you need to be to operate a personality centric business, Dave is often right and even more often, close. We're hardly alone on following his exploits over time.

It all began with a note we sent him regarding our mother's ability to use a computer and truckstops on the internet.

Dave runs a company called Userland. Userland publishes a piece of software called Manilla that is a tool for developing websites that contain content. To validate the flexibility of his tools and visions, Dave launched a "weblogs for free" website last year.

So, what's a Weblog. Think of them as a new kind of journalism, a constantly updated website with pointers around the web, audiences of little groups, idiosyncratic authors, limited editing. Remember ENorimicom? Their parent company, 37 Signals, runs a weblog. A weblog is the prototypical way to communicate with tightly defined audiences. If you are looking for the fabled "online community", your survey had better include Weblogs.

One of the most interesting (and widely read) weblogs is developed by the folks at Online Journalism.com. Complete with its own JobBoard, the OJ Weblog reaches out to a very specific set of readers with very specific interests. We believe that these are the sorts of platforms that will drive the next rounds of mico-niche job board development.