"right now, i'm thinking a lot about blogs. blogs, blogs, blogs. blogs all the time around here. currently, i'm co-producing, with technophile Beverly Tang, a panel on blogging that will take place on February 1st at Miltos Manetas' Electronic Orphanage under the Rhizome banner. cyberfille Xeni Jardin will be moderating. the current line-up thus far features the likes of Mark Frauenfelder, Doc Searls, and myself. two other panelists are still being virtually hunted down like e-dogs in the cyberstreet at this time.

i would like to find someone who is alternoblogging. vlogging. audioblogging. moblogging. blogging-as-art. photoblogging with no words whatsoever ever. blogging in a newish way that pushes at the boundaries of the medium. and, they have to be in LA on 2/1. do you know of anyone? it was nice to hear from Jeff Jarvis, Howard Rheingold, and Joi Ito. but, i would like to hear about an alternoblogger too."

The World Health Organisation (WHO) estimates that 1.5 million infants die around the world every year because they are not breastfed. Where water is unsafe a bottle-fed child is up to 25 times more likely to die as a result of diarrhoea than a breastfed child.

"You learn to deal with the scheduled blackouts, you know when they are and for how many hours. But the last couple of days have been really bad. Very erratic, they turn it on and off whenever they like. We just freeze and thaw then freeze again. It has been very cold for the season and it is expected to get colder. The prices of kerosene heaters have gone thru the roof. There is a local factory, state owned, which manufactures these heaters, 130,000 Iraqi Dinars a pop. But buying one requires approval from the general manager. Don't ask. I can't figure why. It wouldn't be called bureaucracy otherwise.
Now take your newly acquired heater and stand in front of the company's building, someone will offer you 200,000 Iraqi Dinars for it within a minute. Look for it in the shops you will find it for 260,000 ID. That's free market economy isn't it? I decided it was cheaper to bring down an extra blanket."

"People who are thinking about committing suicide search Google for 'suicide.' Depending on what they find, they may or may not kill themselves. There are businesses that depend on the kind of results that searchers get from Google, but that's very secondary compared to searches like 'suicide.'"

"They say you play soccer the way you are. I think blogging is similar to this self-organizing sport. You blog the way you are.

When confronted with the chronological format of a blog, the pressure to post is at first extreme. How do I start? What if I don't keep it up? Does this go on my permanent record? But the reality is there is no shame in an empty calendar. Post daily, weekly, monthly or occassionally. You blog when you can.

The question that is most personal is what to blog. As one blogger said, "Find a topic and own it." Finding focus is a sure time saver, but it also contributes to the medium, as its one of specialized voices. The more you post on your domain the better. You blog what you are.

The other part, indeed what this tribe is about, is community. When you have others reading, others you know, their feedback and their own posts spark your own. You don't blog alone.

Make a little plan on how you will start, just begin and you will find your rhythm."

A weblog is a record of travels on the Web, so a mobile phone log ('moblog'?) should be a record of travels in the world. Weblogs reflect our lives at our desks, on our computers, referencing mostly other flat pages, links between blocks of text. But mobile blogs should be far richer, fueled by multimedia, more intimate data and far-flung friends. As we chatter and text away, our phones could record and share the parts we choose: a walking, talking, texting, seeing record of our time around town, corrected and augmented by other mobloggers.