(Before you think it, we've heard the one about people who live in glass houses and the associated stone throwing.)

With hundreds of blogs in the Recruiting space, it's probably time for an assessment. Are we better or worse off because of the blog explosion. Are blogs making a difference worth noting?

On the one hand, it's virtually impossible to keep up with the explosion of voices. We try to give a window into the best material with our BoB series. Even so, there are things worth following and things worth ignoring. Here are the things we're wondering about:

• Some very powerful voices have emerged. Jeff Hunter, Dub Dubs, Michael Sprecht, The Recruiting Edge, Shally, Jeremy Langhans, Glen Gutmacher, Frank Mulligan, Jason Davis, Marc Cendella, Dave Lefkow, Colin Kingsbury, Joel Cheesman, David Kippen and a host of others offer strong, biased information rooted in experience and hard work.
   
• There's an echo chamber effect within the industry. An idea routes around the various blogs and gains credibility precisely because it is repeated so often. RSS feeds are a major contributing factor to the phenomenon.
   
• People who inhabit the blog realms tend to think that that's the only world. We are getting a constant stream of ill mannered letters from people who say something like, "I've responded to your idea at http://www.xxx.yyy.blog.com ." Apparently, they think that putting a link in a note is a guarantee that something will be read. We call it "too lazy to cut and paste." We never click on the link.
   
• Paying 5 minutes attention per week to each of the 141 blogs in our blogroll would take 12 hours per week. Actually thinking about some of them would take a full time blog reader.
   
• While there is an explosion of material, there doesn't seem to be a real focus on audiences. Everyone is talking about the same stuff ad nauseum. Blogs won't survive well if the writers don't invest the time to create original, meaty content.
   
• A few leaders have embraced the idea of blogging as market/thoiught leadership. They are changing the way that the Senior Executive Job is done. Look at Stephen Rothberg, Colin Kingsbury, Jason Goldberg, Martin Snyder, David Manaster, Marc Cendella and others are redefining the way that marketing works.
   
• Still, information overload is information overload. At Recruiting.com, they're trying hard to be a clearing house. The problem is that editorial expertise and celebrity seem to come from two different places. It's hard to be the news and to make it. We watch their work very closely because the industry needs what Recruiting.com might offer.

So, the blogging scene is evolving with some questions rising to the surface but no clear trends just yet. There's a lot to process and things are taking form. Clarity remains elusive.

We keep updating the blogroll. There are now 141 Recruiting related blogs.