Can Blogs Survive w/o the MSM?

While contemplating the critiques of the MSM by Dan Gillmor and others, this random thought passed through my brain: An enormous volume of blog posts on social and political issues pivot off of articles published in MSM outlets. Given this, would blogging on social and political issues be as rich were it not for these foils?

How To Start A Blog

A very nice series on How to Start a Blog: Part I | Part II | Part III | Part IV. What you do from there is up to you.

Hat tip to Instapundit

Digital Cameras are Mainstream

According to the recently completed 2003-2004 PMA Industry Trends Report: Retail Markets

digital camera sales are estimated to have grown 30 percent in 2004 to 25.1 million units and accounted for 67 percent of all camera sales. Digital camera penetration is expected to be slightly above 40 percent of the U.S.household population compared to almost 30 percent in 2003.

That' s impressive!

The summary continues:

Adoption of printing services lagged behind that of digital cameras, but as consumers became interested in printing their digital images a variety of home and retail printing options have emerged and the number of digital prints made has rapidly grown. In 2004, digital prints are estimated to have reached 4.9 billion prints and are projected to grow 51 percent in 2005 to 7.4 billion and account for 28 percent of total print volume. Total print volume-which includes home printing-was down in 2004, but in 2005 it is expected to remain flat at 26.3 billion prints. Printing of traditional film and digital prints at retail, however, will fall from 23.2 to 22.4 billion prints. So, while retail digital printing will grow it will not offset retail volume losses of traditional film processing.

Looking to the future, after digital camera sales peak, retailers will need to continue to focus on sales of consumables and accessories. And as digital cameras become the primary camera for most households, continuous innovation of printing and services will be necessary for retailers to continue to generate revenue. In addition to growing the number of prints made, retailers will need to stimulate usage of unprinted images through new sharing and custom product options. If retailers do not continuously improve their offerings, some images will go unused and more consumers may choose to print at home.

With online photo sharing (e.g., www.flickr.com), email, the ability to view photos on portable devices (e.g., PDAs), internet enabled photo frames, etc., I predict the number of prints made will decline significantly before it plateaus out; people have fewer reasons to make prints than before. (UPDATE 17 Jan 2005: More on Photo Sharing Sites from Wired and SocialSoftwareWeblog).

I predict increasing sales of products customized with a digital image (e.g., calendars, mugs, shirts, etc.) because it is easier to have these products made than before. OTOH, I suspect these products yield better profit than prints.

Blogs: The Killer App?

Are blogs the killer app we've been waiting for? The app through which the potential of the internet as a communication medium makes a quantum leap? All the hoopla directed at blogs lately (quick round-up here, quantified here with more here) suggests a killer app blogs may be.

To be clear, the blog per-se isn't the killer app. Rather it is the software--Blogger, Bloglines, movable Type, Gray Matter--that make blogging relatively simple that is the true engine. The ease of creating and maintaining a blog has increased dramatically. Opportunity for further simplification is still rampant, to be sure. One still needs to have rudimentary HTML knowledge, for example, to manage a blog. As blogging and feed aggregating software approach the ease of use that characterize MS Word or a typical web browser, blogs will be well poised to achieve saturation.

Incomplete Manifesto for Growth

Check out Bruce Mau's Incomplete Manifesto for Growth. While you are at it, check out his philosophy, too. Wonderful stuff.

VoIP Assessed and Predictions

Curious about the recent past and predicted future of VoIP? Check out One Look Back, Two Steps Forward A user's guide to the VoIP revolution.

How fast will TVoIP sprout?

When Manufactured WOM Goes Sour

What happens when a manufactured word of mouth (WOM) campaign is wounded by a weak product? Brand Autopsy dissects BzzAgent.

Dan Gillmor Practices What He Preaches

In We the Media, Dan Gillmor outlines the virtues of blog-enabled grassroots journalism. Effective the beginning of this year, Dan left his "tenured" job at the San Jose Mercury News to pursue the emergent self-organizing journalism outlined so well in his book. Here's what Dan says about the transition. Best of luck Dan!

I wonder: is grassroots value creation on the horizon?

The State of Blogging

Pew Internet has released their report on The State of Blogging. Here's the : abstract:

"By the end of 2004 blogs had established themselves as a key part of online culture. Two surveys by the Pew Internet & American Life Project in November established new contours for the blogosphere: 8 million American adults say they have created blogs; blog readership jumped 58% in 2004 and now stands at 27% of internet users; 5% of internet users say they use RSS aggregators or XML readers to get the news and other information delivered from blogs and content-rich Web sites as it is posted online; and 12% of internet users have posted comments or other material on blogs. Still, 62% of internet users do not know what a blog is.

The full report is available here (pdf format).

Is Broadband Microsoft's Biggest Threat?

Is the expanding adoption of broadband Microsoft's biggest Threat? Mike Thinks so:

More users than ever use broadband connections at home these days. Though it will take time, these connections will do nothing but get faster. With companies figuring out seemingly every day how to cram more information down the same pipes, and new options like fixed wireless and fiber to the door becoming available, connectivity options for the average consumer are ever-expanding, and with them, the speeds available.

This spells the doom of the modern computer, and the modern operating system as we know it

Read the rest. Hat tip to Slashdot.