Here’s what you’ll find at the bottom of page 15 and all of page 16 in But Still They Blog: The Liblog Landscape 2007-2009: (with one subheading eliminated)
The Rabid Librarian’s Ravings in the Wind
“Born, like other comic book characters, out of an otherwise trivial but life-changing animal bite, the Rabid Librarian seeks out strange, useless facts, raves about real and perceived injustices, and seeks to meet her greatest challenge of all–her own life.” By Eilir Rowan. Began October 2001.
| Metrics | 2007 | 2008 | 2009 | C08-09 | C07-09 |
| Posts | 211 | 170 | 176 | 4% | -17% |
| Quintile | 1 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 2 |
| Words per post | 170 | 237 | 204 | -14% | 20% |
| Quintile | 4 | 3 | 4 | 4 | 2 |
Impressively active, varied, personal blog on all aspects of life and libraries. (There were comments in 2009, but slightly fewer than 0.05 per post.) These aren’t high quarters, by the way: Annual posting totals were 663 for 2008, 653 for 2007, 808 for 2006…and more than 1,000 in 2004.
wiredfu
“another wretched hive of scum and villainy” Began December 2001.
| Metrics | 2007 |
| Posts | 5 |
| Quintile | 5 |
| Words per post | 53 |
| Quintile | 5 |
The most recent post is dated February 1, 2008. A sidebar item is a little clearer—wishing people Happy 2008 and saying: “I’ve made a New Years resolution to post more. But then again, I made that same resolution in 2007 and 2006. So, at this rate, I hope you enjoy 2009 as well.”
rawbrick.net
“A personal weblog.” Began January 2002.
| Metrics | 2007 | 2008 | 2009 | C08-09 | C07-09 |
| Posts | 58 | 40 | 35 | -13% | -40% |
| Quintile | 2 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 2 |
| Words per post | 225 | 277 | 213 | -23% | -5% |
| Quintile | 3 | 3 | 4 | 4 | 4 |
| Comments per post | 0.1 | 0.2 | 0.03 | -84% | -79% |
| Quintile | 4 | 4 | 4 | 5 | 5 |
Mostly, but not entirely, movie (on DVD) reviews, including placeholders.
The Shifted Librarian
“Shifting libraries at the speed of byte!” By Jenny Levine. Began January 2002.
| Metrics | 2007 | 2008 | 2009 | C08-09 | C07-09 |
| Posts | 86 | 34 | 8 | -76% | -91% |
| Quintile | 1 | 2 | 4 | 4 | 5 |
| Words per post | 546 | 374 | 342 | -9% | -37% |
| Quintile | 1 | 2 | 2 | 4 | 5 |
| Comments per post | 2.2 | 5.9 | 6.3 | 6% | 184% |
| Quintile | 1 | 1 | 1 | 3 | 1 |
This blog has shifted over the years—from a primary focus on “shifted” librarianship, to a primary focus on gaming in libraries, to a mixture of topics.
Who cares? Won’t there be a replacement?
As to whether you should care or not, that’s your call. I’m doing some additional promotion and excerpting from the book to remind people that’s still around. I believe it’s the best look at liblogs (or the biblioblogosphere, if you prefer)–and the only one with brief comments on most, but not all, blog profiles.
To some extent, this book does replace The Liblog Landscape 2007-2008–but only to some extent:
- The 2009 book does not include measurements on use of illustrations in liblogs.
- The 2009 book has somewhat more stringent requirements for blog inclusion.
- If you’re looking for a particular blog profile, you may find the 2008 book–with its 145-page final chapter consisting of all the profiles in straight alphabetic order–easier to use. Profiles are scattered throughout the 2009 book, for logical and stated reasons; you can find them through the index, but that’s a little slower.
As to there being a replacement: Maybe and no.
- Maybe: I’m thinking about (OK, working on) a new liblog survey that is in some ways more ambitious than the 2009 project, but in other ways much less ambitious. Phase 1 is nearly complete. Phase 2 might take a few weeks or several months (depending on other projects). This survey might yield a (considerably smaller) book. It might not.
- No: One of the ways in which the new project is much less ambitious is that there will not be profiles of individual blogs, and the index will not include the names of bloggers (I’m not even recording those). The only way there could be a new set of profiles, covering up to four years of blogging activity, is with direct advance sponsorship for the work required; the probability of that happening is somewhere close to the probability of, say, the Dow reaching 20,000 by the end of Summer 2010.
When the 2008 book emerged, a couple of people said they’d find it a lot more interesting if they had my comments on individual blogs. The 2009 book has those comments–brief ones, and omitting any absolutely damning comments, but still. And, of course, I did not include the 2008 profiles in the Cites & Insights version of the 2008 book.
