Since it’s now past September 15, 2010, the cutoff for one of three “crowdsource” requests related to The Way We Blog, the comprehensive English-language liblog study I’m working on, an update may be in order.
- I received a total of 33 candidates (that weren’t obvious exclusions such as official library blogs) in response to “Liblogs: What am I missing?” Of those, six were blogs that began in June, July or August 2010 and are thus too new for a study with May 31, 2010 as a cutoff–although it’s good to know that library people are still starting blogs. One was an official blog, based on its banner and the nature of its posts. One just wasn’t there: Clicking on the link didn’t get me to a blog. And I added 25 more blogs to the list, which now includes 1,296 liblogs (and 1,325 excluded names). Update Friday, September 17, 2010: I’d forgotten one blog directory, almost (but not quite) all official library blogs, mostly from school libraries. I wound up with eight more liblogs, for a new and “final” total of 1,304–although I’m certain some of those have already disappeared since I started gathering metrics.
- I’ve received a handful of responses to “Blog country of origin: A crowdsource request.” I’m not tracking these responses, but I’m grateful for them. (My guess is that nearly all of the ones I don’t get responses for are US-based, but I could certainly be wrong.) I’ll leave that request open through October 1, 2010, as noted in the post.
- I’ve also received a handful of responses (a larger handful, with more direct email) to “One more crowdsource request: How many posts?” and I’ll leave that request open through October 14, 2010 (which is also the earliest point at which I’d actually start analyzing and writing up all this stuff). As anticipated, most responses have come from the bloggers themselves, since they can usually find the number of posts very easily. I’d love to get a bunch more responses here–for the blogs on the list in that post, that is.
Otherwise? I’ve finished the validation/verification pass. I’m doing one more brief pass (inv0lving about 145 blogs, with 80 of them left to do) in support of a decision to make the analysis just a little more comprehensive. Then I’ll set it aside, think about the present and future of Cites & Insights (or maybe just write some essays), and focus on Open Access…until that project’s done and it’s October 14 or later.
Thanks to all those who have responded so far, and to the many, many, huge number of blog owners (including blogs both dead and alive) with blogs on that third list who are just about to send me the total count of posts from the inception of the blog through May 31, 2010. waltcrawford at gmail dot com.
