Ah, but is it worthwhile?

Blogs are a means of selling. So, what makes them different from graduation announcements or personal ads?
Ah, debatably the most vital element of the Internet: immediacy.
According to Reed,

Weblog entries are meant to be ‘of the moment,’ a record of how the individual felt or thought at that particular point in time… In contrast to handwritten diaries (many bloggers report keeping them in the past), whose entries are usually delayed, the weblog is valued for capturing a person’s impressions almost as they occur. Indeed, journal bloggers make a virtue of this technology, insisting that individuals should type as they think or feel, that is, without forethought or craft (posts are not usually planned or edited) (227).

He also asserts that “instead of an act of composition, blogging is usually conceived as a form of channeling.” (228). This summary of blogs, that they tend to be unedited rants about personal experiences or feelings, seems to be accurate (see the Livejournal Rants community for an example). That’s the charm of the blog: there is no revising taking place, besides a skim for punctuation errors and a spellcheck.

However, does the immediacy and lack of craft invalidate blogs as literature? It’s obvious bloggers aren’t working on the next Mrs. Dalloway; but should they be judged on the same level?

Are bloggers creating something that be canonized, or are they filling innocent web sites with drivel? Traditional literature can be split into good or bad, so why not blogs? As Oscar Wilde wrote, “books are well written, or badly written. That is all” (Preface to The Picture of Dorian Gray).

Looking at it this way, blogs are the same – we shouldn’t generalize the genre simply because it isn’t based on painstaking work. After reading a blog, we should determine whether it is good or bad. The act of criticism – consideration -- legitimizes the blog.