Blog is an online platform which allows users to write whatever they want, such as expressing feeling, or simply blog about something interesting that happened on certain day. I have my own personal blog, which is mostly used to express my feelings rather than blog about serious issue. Blogger, Wordpress and Live Journal are among the well-known blog service providers. Blog has provided freedom for people to write like a journalist online. However, what impact and benefits does blogging phenomenon brings?
(Image source: Wordpress.com, 2009)According to Loewenstein, in country like China, the implication brought by the blogging is that the bloggers are making use of the freedom of speech online to reveal the scandals and corruption which is less or not covered at all by the mainstream media, such as the public protests about the the weak construction of building which causes many building to collapse during the occurance of earthquake in Sichuan (Funnell, 2008). The truth that are buried by the media, are revealed online through blogging. Therefore, blogging phenomenon brings freedom of speech in the internet.
(Image source: Problogger.net, 2009)In my opinion, blogging has, in fact, impacts in many other fields, such as educational, business, entertainment and even political fields. For example, in Malaysia, many politicians such as our Prime Minister Dato' Sri Najib Tun Razak and Lim Kit Siang are using blogs to spread their inflence and also communicate and interact with people. By making good and correct use of blogging as a tool for marketing purpose, it may helps in increasing the product sale, get additional income by advertising on the blog, and can even use it as a customer service tool to interact and communicate with clients (Gehl, 2006). Undoubtly, good marketing skills, good relationships with customers, excellent sales force and support customers are crucial in making a marketing blog goes success, but if one has an excellent idea about a product that is worth selling, strong support at the back and has targeted the potential customers, the process will be smoother (Wright, 2006 ).
As a conclusion, blogging phenomenon has brings a lot of benefits and impact in today's world. There may be an increase in freedom of speech, but we should be careful and resposible about what we wrote and published. There was once a person, Jeffery Gargaro, was arrested after posting his opinion about the shooting rampage in Washington, because his post was seen as a threat by the police (Chang, 2008). Therefore, there are still some regulations and rules while blogging online that we need to obey.
References:
- Chang, B 2008, Man arrested for writing blog on a newspaper website, Kare11.com, viewed 7th June 2010,
- Funnell, A 2008, The Blogging Revolution, ABC, viewed 7 June 2010, http://www.abc.net.au/rn/mediareport/stories/2008/2351985.htm
- Gehl, D 2006, How to Harness the Marketing Power of Blogs, Entrepreneur, viewed 7 June 2010, http://www.entrepreneur.com/ebusiness/ebusinesscolumnist/article84232.html
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