Blog Rolling Competitions
By Brian Jepson
Weblogs, such as Slashdot and Freshmeat, are popular because of how they present news items and give site visitors a way to comment on them. Slashdot is perhaps the best-known, most-imitated Weblog. Many technology-oriented articles (with a noticeable slant toward open source and free software) appear on the Slashdot home page daily. By following a link, you can view the complete article, see related information, and see the hundreds of comments that inevitably follow each news posting.
If your challenge is to impose order on the frenzied exchange of human ideas, a Weblog (or "blog") is an excellent choice. Months after an article has disappeared from the Slashdot home page, you can still find it by searching or browsing articles within one of the subsections such as Patents, Technology, and Media. In this way, a Weblog can be thought of as a database.
Many months ago, when I was first setting up www.jepstone.net, I wanted to use an open-source Weblog package to run the site. I originally chose Thatware because my site is virtually hosted, so I couldn't use a package that would have required root access. Eventually, I decided that I didn't have the time to manage a site that revolved around highly dynamic information. So, while the Jepstone Weblog Initiative languishes in the recesses of my ~/src directory, you can reap the benefit of my Weblog research.
Organization of a Weblog
There are several kinds of Weblogs, ranging from personal journal sites to more advanced, comment-driven logs.
