New Forms of Media Publishing

New forms of media publishing have certainly altered communication in a new media ecosystem. New media can be defined as the convergence of all types of media. In other words, new media is multimedia. 

(Source: walidazami.files.wordpress.com, 2011)

As we can see, most of the print companies, especially newspapers, are publishing their work on the internet. For instance, The Star Online and New Straits Times Online are online versions of well known newspapers in Malaysia.  

(Source: biz.thestar.com.my, 2011)

(Source: 1.bp.blogspot.com, 2011)

So how these online newspapers did altered the roles of traditional journalism?

Walsh (2006) stated that internet sites vary in the modes they use, but they have the potential to combine words and images in complex structures. Hence, readers of these sites are able to take the cues from a home page to navigate to multiple sites and multi directional. Everywhere writing now involved close attention to typeface choices and layout (Kress & Leeuwen, 1998). This results to online newspaper becoming more appealing to audiences than conventional newspaper. In addition, Pavlik (2011) mentioned that possibly the most significant among the effects of new media on traditional journalism is the transformation of the many relationships that exist between news organizations and their publics. 

References: 

1. Walsh, M 2006, The 'textual shifts': Examining the reading process with print, visual and multimodal texts, Australian Journal of Language and Literacy, vol. 29, no. 1, pp. 24-37.
2. Kress, G Leeuwen, TV 1998, Front pages : (the critical) analysis of newspaper layout, in Approaches to media discourse, eds A Bell, P Garrett, Blackwell, Oxford, pp. 186-219.
3. Pavlik, JV 1999, New Media and News: Implications for the Future of Journalism, New Media & Society, vol. 1, no. 1, pp. 54-59, viewed 6th May 2011, <http://nms.sagepub.com.ezlibproxy.unisa.edu.au/content/1/1/54>

Blogging Community

What is a Blogging Community?

Community is defined as a group of people which shares a common interest. Hence, group of individuals that blog is known as a blogging community.

(Source: 1.bp.blogspot.com, 2011)

Build Your Own Blogging Community

The most significant step is to make your posts entertaining. You definitely want to attract more readers to read your blog. Other than that, you need to get involved and interact with all your readers. It is a big no to turn off commenting on your blog. Bloggers loses some of what makes blogging such a dynamic, exciting medium: the interaction between bloggers and readers (Gardner & Birley, 2010). 

Click here to view more on steps to build a blogging community.

Types of Blogging Community

According to White (2006), there are three types of blogging community which includes:

• Single Blog/ Blogger Centric Community - In this community, one blog is owned by one owner or organization. It may have more than one author for the blog.
• Central Connecting Topic Community - This type of community is formed between blogs which is connected by a common interest or topic. 
• Boundaried Communities - The public are allowed to sign up and join this type of community. Also, they are able to create their own weblog. 

An example of blogging community includes Xanga. Similar to Blogger or Wordpress, Xanga allows the public to create their own free weblog. Images, audio or even video can be added into posts. The one thing that makes it extraordinary is that it allows users to meet new people by viewing or communicate with other blogs users in Xanga, which makes it another social networking site. 

References:

• Gardner, S Birley, S 2010, Blogging for Dummies, 3rd edn, Wiley Publishing, Canada, viewed 5th May 2011, <http://books.google.com.my/books?id=Z7NNQiMx-9cC&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false>
• White, N 2006, Blogs and community – launching a new paradigm for online community?, viewed 5th May 2011, <http://kt.flexiblelearning.net.au/tkt2006/edition-11-editorial/blogs-and-community-%E2%80%93-launching-a-new-paradigm-for-online-community>

Blog Classification

There are many types of blogs which are being created today. According to Sun, Suryanto and Liu (2007), the problem of blog classification is the object to be classified in blog classfication are blogs where each blog consists of a set of blog posts and the number of posts may vary significantly from one blog to another. Other than Blogspot, Wordpress is one of the largest open source blogging software available. Wordpress has an article on the types of blogs that are available on their site. 

A few common categories are:

1. Personal

2. Business

3. Political

4. Directory

5. Sports

(Source: lh6.googleusercontent.com, 2011)

Unlike Wordpress, Simmons classifies blogs by the way information is being presented and analysed in blog posts. Categories that are suggested by Simmons differ from Wordpress. For example, Wordpress classifies certain blogs as political blogs which Simmons will categorize them as pamphleteering blogs. I personally think that the most appropriate method of classifying blog should be similar to the way Wordpress classify blogs, which is identifying the topic and the content of the blog posts.

References: 

1. Goh, DHL, Cao, TH, Solvberg, IT 2007, Asian digital libraries, viewed 16th April 2011, <http://books.google.com.my/books?id=8pxUkfwqt_0C&pg=PA307&dq=blog+classification&hl=en&ei=oHPGTaXEMdDNrQf4rKXVBA&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CCoQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=blog%20classification&f=false>
2. Simons, M 2008, A taxonomy of blogs, The media report, viewed 16th April 2011, <http://www.abc.net.au/rn/mediareport/stories/2008/2372882.htm#transcriptt>
3. Types of Blogs, Wordpress.com, viewed 16th April 2011, <http://en.wordpress.com/types-of-blogs/> 

Blogs as Current Phenomenon & Benefits to the Community

(Source: content.screencast.com, 2011)

As shown in technorati.com, there are a total number of 1,265,302 in their blog directory. This shows how huge the blogosphere is today. Moreover, the number does not just stop there! The blogosphere will continue to expand over the years.

According to Sobel (2010), the latest trends in 2010 are the impact of social networking, like twitter or facebook, on the blogosphere. Bloggers are now using this social networking sites to market their blogs and increase its traffic. Other than that, the author also stated that bloggers are now blogging from their mobile devices, like smart phones. Another term for mobile blogging is moblogging.

Q: What types of blogs are most common in Malaysia?

A: According to BlogMalaysia's directory, personal blogs has the most number, followed by business and career blogs. 

Business and career blogging has brought upon several advantages to the community such as getting immediate feedback of readers. Reymond mentioned on his website that blogging allows you to receive instant feedback from your audience, making you able to tweak and take action better to the market that is targeted. Also, business blogs enables the increase of brand awareness. In netexplorer, Rycroft (2008) mentioned that a blog is a great way to get your brand or product in front of thousands of people who otherwise would never know your existence. 

Reference:

1. Reymond, PV n.d, Advantages of Blogging: 7 Reasons Why You Should Start a Blog, Start Up Internet Business Acceleration, viewed 16th April 2011, <http://internethomebasedbusiness.startup-internetbusiness.com/advantages-of-blogging/>  
2. Rycroft, S 2008, The 10 Business Benefits of Blogging, Net Explorers, viewed 16th April 2011, <http://www.hosting-netexplorers.co.uk/blog/web-marketing/the-10-business-benefits-of-blogging/>
3. Sobel, J 2010, State of the Blogosphere 2010 Introduction, Technorati, viewed 16th April 2011, <http://technorati.com/blogging/article/state-of-the-blogosphere-2010-introduction/>
4. Sobel, J 2010, WHAT: Topic and Trends - Day 2 SOTB 2010, Technorati, viewed 16th April 2011, <http://technorati.com/blogging/article/what-topics-and-trends-day-2/>