Are blogs really for EVERYONE?

Suzanne Stefanac, author of “Dispatches From Blogistan,” says that “until the twentieth century, diaries were largely a pastime of the privileged classes” (49). In light of our class discussion last week, this was an interesting and intriguing concept for me to ponder. It caused me to examine the obvious parallels between traditional journals/diaries and the blogisphere. After reading her text, I felt compelled to asked myself this question: Is web 2.0 blogging a pastime for the privileged?

In my personal opinion, I believe it is. I believe this because in order to create and maintain a blog you must have three important things:

1) Time

2) Clout

3) Technology

Many members of the working or lower class lack one or more of these traits. Time is critical because brainstorming ideas, writing blog posts, monitoring the blogisphere, and responding to comments. Clout is required to develop readership and credibility. Personal access to the technology (ie: laptop, training in online programs, internet access, etc…) is costly and requires a financial investment. In addition to contributing to the blogisphere as an author, reading the hundreds of posts written by your blogging peers is time consuming and exhausting. For the reasons presented, I believe blogging is primarily a pastime of the privileged. I hypothesize that it will remain disproportionately dominated by this group of higher educated people because they are more educated, thus more engaged, with civil issues and technological change.

The second issue I would like to comment on from the reading is the concept of RSS feeds and many-to-many conversation mediums. The idea of an RSS feed, allowing people to subscribe to a steam of conversation on a particular topics, is genius. I love the idea that the information is collected in a portal that I develop and read at my convenience. I have over 50 blogs on my RSS google reader and try to stay updated. However, when life gets busy, it is empowering to use the “Google blog search” tool and just read, for my already narrow list of blogs, the topics that are most important to me in the time I have available.

Questions:

1) How would you recommend changing our educational systems access to technology to level the playing field for all children to learn about new Web 2.0 technologies such as blogging. Do you think blogging is important and lasting enough communication medium to teach in the classroom?

2) At what age is it appropriate to introduce social media to children in an academic setting? How much discretion should teachers be given to decide what is social media and what is an educational tool? What is the risk of not allowing social media in the classroom?