The History of Blog - Blog Evolution

Before blogs were what they are today, they existed in a total different format called online diary. Online diary which came about in 1995, was really a personal diary where individuals would keep an account of their everyday personal lives. This would include stuff such as; daily observations, thoughts, appointments, planned activities, views, moods, poems etc. These online daries were maintained through the internet using a personal website or a one that was provided by a diary hosting company. As the popularity of online diarists increased they became know as online journals. However, as diarists began to combine their sites with links which led to the term "weblog" or "web log". The term "weblog" was coined by Jorn Barger in 1997.

The term "web log" or "weblog" was short lived and was changed in 1999 by Peter Merholz (at peterme.com) who coined the term "blog" which it is called to this day. As blogs gained momentum as it expanded in numbers. Blogs became a social community and the introduction of automated publishing software (blogging software) now became reality. The evolution of blog software systems to process larger data was now a necessity. It simplified the publishing process for thousands of users (publishers ) who were technically illiterate. In August 1999 Blogger.com was created by Pyra lab. Pyra Labs, the company who coined the word “Blogger” now played an important and pivoting role, thus setting the stage for where the blogging system is today. Blogger a blog publishing system, offered the option of installing blogs on their own server Blogspot or a server of ones' own choosing which is transferred via FTP or SFTP. This made it quite simple for thousands of publishers (bloggers) and automated the blogging process, thus , accelerating the publishing process.

However, in February 2003, search engine giant Google purchased Pyra lab. Pyra lab originally charged its bloggers at blogger.com a fee, for those who had the premium features but Google, after acquiring the blog company offered this service totally free of charge. In addittion, it provided bloggers witn an avenue through which they could earn a revenue, by placing affiliates contextually-relevant paid ads (adsense) on their site if they choose to do so. Blogs expanded drastically, since blogs were now into the mainstream with millions of new blogs joining the blogosphere each year. Blogs are now being used by lawyers, businesses, doctors, teachers, writers, media companies, students, ministers and the list goes on. Google even upgraded the blog software system with lots of additional features such as new blog templates, image hosting in post, posts by E-Mail and lately, topic category just to name a few.

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The Definition and Purpose of a Blog: What is a Blog?