The End of Blogging as we know it......

(i) blogging is moving from a diary keeping / ego flaunting hobby to another form of "pro" activity that is a required form of media. The problem is that there is very little direct cash in it, so to play as the bar rises requires increasing offset funding or time.

(ii) the social media tools have arisen to provide an easier, cheaper - and more interactive - alternative to the legions of amateurs and hobbyists.

...among the serious non-professional bloggers this idea of immediacy and easier discovery using things like friends or contacts made using Twitter and other social networks was a strong drawing card. In this group of bloggers I can see future forms of social media much like FriendFeed being added incentive to move away from the blogging format. That doesn’t mean that we won’t always have a hardcore contingent of serious non-professional bloggers I just don’t think that their numbers will be the same and neither will they grow in numbers as they have in the past.

...the career or professional blogger – is much harder to figure out what the road forward is because many times they throw up so many mix messages because I think in some cases they are confused themselves as to where the road is leading. Part of this feeling adrift in a sea of technology is partly the making of the group most commonly referred to as the early adopters. While it was this group for the most part that were to grasp the power that blogs cold hold they are also the one’s that are easily swayed by the next new shiny object syndrome.

Even with all this seeming confusion over where blogging is going there is still a core of both professional and non-professional bloggers who truly see a long term value for the medium. Whether then end up as some sort of new media conglomerate like TechCrunch, Mashable or ReadWriteWeb or just a bunch of really good independent bloggers the point is things are changing.

The trick for many of us – especially the independent bloggers and smaller networks – is to be willing to take advantage of anyway that comes our way to communicate with our readers. We can’t be afraid of changes as they happen but instead embrace them and use them to our benefit.

(i) Comments are devolving to other organs such as Friendfeed, which aggregate comments into conversations. We've discussed this before (see here)

(ii) Comments are "blog posts" in and of themselves, a thought initially expressed by Fred Wilson.

But at the same time I also feel that commenting is easy. Easy, not because the stuff that is written down is obvious in any way. But easy because the original blog writer triggered a commenter to think and react. And that is what Blogging is all about. Some are in it for the money, some are in it for the fun. But a great blog post, no matter what it is about, makes the reader think. And that is what is so hard about blogging. I always try to write posts in such a way that my thoughts trigger other people to think and respond. I don’t have to be right. But I love it if it starts a conversation with people. Because out if this conversation there is always something to learn.

If today’s bloggers find it too challenging, those of us who have the energy and interest to keep going welcome their leaving. Commenting is simple. It can take seconds. Blogging and bringing something useful to the conversation is more difficult. But blogging can truthfully be anything you want it to be. It can be your personal diary. It doesn’t have to be a news site, as many of us have gravitated to.

(i) If blogging - ie creation - is the hard thing, and commenting is easy, how does taking all the comments and conversation off-blog (especially into new walled gardens) reward the original writer for the creative effort?

(ii) Assuming it does not reward the writer, and drives the creator out, how does off-blog commenting sustain itself?