Geographers meet Blogosphere

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1) The Peaches are a group of geographers that encountered the blogosphere in this attempt to understand this new phenomenon in Geographical terms.

2) Introducing the Geography honors class to the blogosphere.

There is no better way to do this than to bring the blogosphere to the Geographers through a blog. Experience the Blogosphere.

Most importantly, what makes the blogosphere are the bloggers and they are standing right before you! Experience the Bloggers.

Blogosphere

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(n) The collective term that encompasses all blogs as a community or social network, often likened as a social phenomenon.

The term “weblog” was first used in 1997 (Bell et al, 2004) and blogging in its current form also began around the same time (Nardi et al, 2004).

The term "blogosphere" also surfaced around 1999 but was only popularized in 2002 by the warblog community.

There are 3 types of blogs: (Herring et al, 2004)
1. Individually authored diary-style
- e.g. Xiaxue

2. "Filters" - provide commentary to other website
- e.g. Boing Boing, Tomorrow.sg

3. "Knowledge logs"
- e.g. Bird Ecology Study Group

There are also thematic blogs like:
- photoblogs
- flogs (or "Food Log")
- dlogs (or "Dog Logs")
- vlogs (or "Video Logs")

So what's the big deal?

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What distinguishes blogs from traditional web publications are that:

1) Weblogs are densely interconnected.

2) Bloggers read other blogs, link to them, reference them in their own writing, and readers may even annotate entries with comments. At the same time, there is controlled interaction, unlike other forms of CMC such as instant messaging (Tirapat et al, 2006).

3) Blogs facilitate two-way communication that is in some ways similar to earlier self-publishing and fanzine 'subculture' (Bell et al, 2004).

4) They are touted as a new voice for traditional mass-market newspapers and print media (Rosenbloom, 2004).

The Blogosphere and Geography

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Being a relatively new social phenomenon, little scholarly research has been done with specific regards the blogosphere, especially by geographers.

Much of current available literature on the blogosphere however, though predominantly written with the use of communications and sociological perspectives, has largely integrated geographical concepts.

But although geographical concepts have been used largely in much of the literature surrounding the blogosphere, little has been written in specific geographical perspective.

This may be due to erroneous perception that research on the blogosphere belong to the disciplines of information communications and computing technology.

The blogosphere however can be approached geographically as a spatial entity, and its spatial dimension consequently explored in relation with notions of power and identity.

Blogospheres as Spatial Entities

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The appearance of blogospheres are corollary to the proliferation of information and communications technologies in the 21st Century - some (like "hyperglobalist" Kenichi Ohmae, 1991) proclaim "the death of distance" this era in development.

Wilson and Corey (2000:1) propose that space remains important in conceptualizing the electronic world.

A geographical approach informs the processes and manifestations of a reified CYBERSPACE, in particular the geography of interactions and "spatial" organization on the internet and its corresponding effects on real space.

Blogospheres may thus be situated within such spatial discourses.

"Sites" (in this instance, blogs) in cyberspace are accorded representational meaning and linked to each other in dense networks, generating cyber-spatially distinct entities given the spatial metaphor “blogospheres”.

Graham (2000:11) however, cautions against an assumption of homogeneity in cyberspatial landscapes.

"There is not one single, unified cyberspace; rather, there are multiple, heterogenous networks" (Graham, 2000: 24) within which technologies inter-relate with humans.

It is here that a geographical approach further informs critical perspectives of such heterogenous and potentially exclusionary spaces, elaborated on in the sections following.

Blogospheres and Power

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A postmodern examination of blogospheres highlights the latter’s potential sphere of influence in several areas such as media and politics, vis-à-vis such new avenues for individual expression in the blogosphere.

The nature of the blogosphere – possessed of individual expression, a large distribution of readers, and interaction with traditional media outlets – enable weblogs to exert an influence over policy and political outputs (Drezner and Farrell, 2004).

Influential ability of the blogosphere on media and politics: “blogs can socially construct an agenda or interpretive frame that acts as a focal point for mainstream media, shaping and constraining the larger political debate.” (Drezner and Farrell, 2004).

Blogosphere has also been effective in affecting pressure in the economy. For Secko (2005), the blogosphere is linked to power and business networking.

Secko’s (2005) poststructural examination of blogospheres and power relations demonstrate clearly how the use of blogospheres as a platform for, and medium of, expression can alter the dynamics of power relationships between agents.

Blogospheres and Identity

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Weblogs must be “studied as sites for identity construction and self-invention” (Paasonen, 2002: 22).

Rak (2005) identified the blogosphere as “a potential site for thinking about queer identity, electronic identity, and liberal discourses of identity based on individual agency, unity, and the primacy of individual experiences”.

Creation of a sense of collective and personal identity in the blogosphere.

Connectivity among like-minded individuals in the blogosphere allows an individual to not only “break free of an antiquated vision of one identity” (Vasta, 2005), but “develop a new collective identity based on a ‘we’ community" (Vasta, 2005), effectively constructing a collective identity and a sense of belonging to a community.

The blogosphere presents also a unique opportunity for an individual to reinvent or reinforce their personal identity via the “unruly multiplicity” of the social identity in blogospheres (Paasonen, 2002: 22).

A number of weblogs deceivingly comprise the taking up of a fictitious persona, and/or the chronicling of fictitious events and experiences (Vasta, 2005).

Each individual can challenge, change and create identity categories through the power of virtual identities or persona in the blogosphere. Consequently, the complexity between the blogosphere, identity and power underscores caution against assuming homogeneity in the blogosphere.

Critical Perspectives of Blogospheres

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While the blogosphere, located in cyberspace, potentially enables universal access and endorses social equality, an emphasis of a geographical approach to the blogosphere however informs critical perspectives of such assumedly-homogeneous and potentially exclusionary spaces.

Shirky (2003) highlights Marxist developments in the blogosphere by tracing a phenomenon wherein bloggers have within themselves established internal hierarchies and elite communities.

Post-structural considerations of the blogosphere have also been explored by scholars such as Pole (2005), who acknowledged the variable and contingent ways in which social categories such as race are reflected within the blogosphere.

Feminist thoughts on blogosphere: gendered digital landscape where females go through the experience differently from men (Brunner 1991, from Light, 1995).

Conclusion

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Much of current available literature on the blogosphere has largely integrated geographical concepts, but little has been written in specific geographical perspective.

Blogospheres, in postmodern expressions of individuality and post-structural power relationships, are a cyberspatial platform on which a person can express individual, radical, and influential thoughts and opinions on variety of subjects.

Space remains important in conceptualizing the electronic world, and blogospheres may thus be situated within such spatial discourses.

Graham (2000:11) however, cautions against an assumption of homogeneity in cyberspatial landscapes.

It is here that a geographical approach can:

approach blogospheres as spatial entities,
explore blogospheres in relation with notions of power and identity,
and further inform critical perspectives of such heterogenous and potentially exclusionary spaces