Classification of blogs

There are hundreds of millions of blogs out there and of course, there are differences in contents as they are moderated by different editors and writers around the world, regardless how famous they are. But somehow, there are a few patterns done to classify these blogs.

Margaret Simons, an author and media analyst, classifies blogs into the following categories. Here, she (2008) stated that blogs can be divided into 9 groups: Pamphleteering, Digest, Advocacy, Popular Mechanics, Exhibition, Gatewatcher, Diary, Advertisement and News Blog.

However, Simons doesn't classify blogs as a whole, as blogs can be vary through subjects, types of publisher and methods of blogging. For example, a photographer's blog can fall into both the Advertisement and Exhibition category if he shows his artworks in his site while promoting his studio at the same time.

Source: Wedshooter.TV.

Caption: Wedshooter.tv is an online guide for wedding photography, and it can be an Advertisement, Digest, Exhibition and Diary at the same time. 

The most commonly used classification methods of blogs are through the topics of a blog and the method that they use to blog. Classifying blogs by subjects are commonly used in various blog networks nowadays, as different people enjoy reading different genres of blogs. Here, within a subject, a publisher/blogger will tend to use his most creative ways to send his or her messages to the audiences. Thus, they will use various styles of blogging, such as vlogging (video blogging), and moblogs. 

Vlog - or video blogging is currently a big trend and it is growing in video streaming sites, particularly in YouTube. Meefeedia.com has done a research for vlog statistics (2010) and found that there are over 11,000 vlogs around the Internet. As video bloggers continue to grow, video sites such as Vimeo, Myspace.TV begin gaining popularity. 

Some bloggers tend to get the best of both worlds. For example, Marlina Orlova of Russia entered stardom by being a celebrity blogger in Youtube and blogosphere at the same time. 

Source: hotforwords.com - Marlina's blog

Source: http://www.youtube.com/hotforwords - Marlina's vlog

In conclusion, the best categorization on blogs are classifying them through their subjects and topics, as they are the most accurate and most related aspect of a blog. 

References: 

Mefeedia, 2010, State of the Vlogosphere 2010, viewed April 18, 2010, <http://blog.mefeedia.com/vlog-2010>

Simons, M, 2008, Towards A Taxonomy of Blogs, viewed April 18, 2010, <http://www.apo.org.au/commentary/towards-taxonomy-blogs-0>