Diary Vs Blog

I was off to Chennai 2 days back and made good use of my time on the way there. Took a print out of an article on KM, Blogging and Storytelling and lapped it up on the way. T'was a good compilation of various views and perspectives on the topic, I thought! Frankly, I've been very excited about the prospect of leveraging on Blogging for knowledge sharing and KM...and the authors of the article I read were too. I was getting carried away with the article and wondering what would be the link like between KM and Blogging a couple of years down the line, when I looked up at the green fields we were passing by and something in my mind gave in to gravity and fell with a thud. Blogs might be a highly celebrated concept amongst many of us but in reality all they are can be expressed in a simple equation:

Blogs = Diary + Technology (Sorting, Linking, Grouping, Subscribing, and Searching)

Of course, a Blog that has been thrown open to the world will vary in its content Vis a Vis a personal diary and can allow for comments that improve/challenge one's perspective. Anyways, all said and done, the clear differentiator here is technology. Technology here not only plays the role of an enabler but also helps change the rules altogether by evolving the very concept of introspection and associated global connectivity.

In this article that I read, the authors quote a Blogger who says that Blogging helped her realize her own interests and more importantly made her value her own point of view highly as she found herself considering her own opinions and ideas and realized how unique they were.

How true! :)

Another thing that this article made me think about was the difference between a personal Blog and a public Blog. I've been Blogging for months now and only recently decided to throw it open to some people whose opinion I value. I already sense a difference in the way I Blog and what I Blog. Before throwing it open, I rarely spent a second in thinking about whether the contents of my Blog would create controversy or be appreciated or criticized. All I was doing was prying open my own mind and questioning myself and telling myself things. Now, I also feel the need to pass on information that I think others might find to be useful and not just introspect. I find myself thinking just a little more about whether I should be saying some things or not (not really sure if that's good ;)).

PS: The article - Grassroots KM through Blogging - by Maish Nichani and Venkat Rajamanickam - appeared in elearning post on May 14th 2001.