United Brethren has retired.

Vote Dave and Justin. But what of the future?

Call it British self-deprecation, but I'm not going to demand you vote United Brethren over at intellecxhibitionist (well, you can if you want, or create a new category - Best Semi-British Blog, or recognise John's A bird's eye view). Although T&S is clearly in a world of its own, you should vote for whatever combination of Justin n' Dave you can. DMI is a wonderfully cosy little blog, and Mormon Wasp is the blog equivalent of All Bran for breakfast. They get my vote (and should consider a permanent merger).

BTW, Splendid Sun is my favourite new blog. I'm wondering to myself what future developments the Bloggernacle might herald. Should the smaller blogs combine into larger group blogs? Or perhaps the smaller blogs could organise a kind of blog-ring/creative partnership where we publicise each other and/or rotate guest blogging appearances? Email me off-list if you want: ronan at jhu dot edu.

Comments

Anonymous Anonymous said ... (January 23, 2005 5:18 PM) 

Thanks for your consideration. I’ve been thinking lately about the future of Mormon themed blogs. In these blogs, we are essentially formalizing and recording conversations. When a thread is spent, it seems that there is a feeling that there is nothing more to say. Any subsequent posts must consider the entire previous thread. In 2 or 5 years (or however many) when a blog starts a thread on a topic that has been thoroughly vetted by a mega-thread back during the first year of the bloggernacle, will they have to reference it? Does this squash the potential of these new bloggers to have meaningful “conversations” on the same turf (regardless if it is the same conversation or not)?

As for collaboration…rock on. 

Posted by J. Stapley

 

Anonymous Anonymous said ... (January 24, 2005 11:17 AM) 

J: new bloggers = new audience probably.

My idea of "collaboration" is as follows: a few blogs with mutual admiration join together into a kind of "alliance", with rotating guest bloggers and a few other partner-benefits. Anyway, I'm still thinking this through and will email the Splendid Sun off list. 

Posted by Ronan

 

Anonymous Anonymous said ... (January 24, 2005 2:01 PM) 

Please do.

As for the future of blogs: Unless there is a distinct emergent demographic (female geriatric genealogy enthusiasts), I see it as more of an evolution, with the community just simply growing. 

Posted by J. Stapley

 

Anonymous Anonymous said ... (January 24, 2005 5:49 PM) 

Ronan--I'm with you; I loved having Dave and Justin blogging in one place. And agree that they are the ones to vote for in Best Blogger and Individual Blog categories.

As for redundant conversations, J.--I'm not sure people ever get tired of some topics, or run out of things to say, and there are always new people to raise the same argument in a different way. Witness the neverending series of threads on the Word of Wisdom, or gay marriage, or women's roles at T&S. Still, we can hope that someday Nate Oman's son will be writing about how stale and repetitive the blogging genre has become, and found a magazine called Sunstone in which he'll publish his fresh and trenchant insights :) 

Posted by Kristine

 

Anonymous Anonymous said ... (January 24, 2005 10:21 PM) 

Thanks for the plug, Ronan. FWIW, United Brethren got a vote from me in the mid-size category. Too bad there's no "international blog" category. 

Posted by Dave

 

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