March 02, 2004

ELITE

A while back I wrote a post about how bloggers are like gods to me but most people would star at you blankly if you said the name Glenn Reynolds. Tim pointed out to me today just how elite we bloggers are: Between 2 and 7 percent of American adults blogging.

What the heck does everyone else do while blow drying their hair?

Posted by Sarah at March 2, 2004 01:46 PM
Comments

Interesting that most people who visit blogs are friends and family. None of my family (except Bogey) bothers with reading mine at all.

Posted by: Mike at March 2, 2004 02:11 PM

I bet those are for like personal blogs. Most people probably have blogs where they talk about more personal things like their day or their new baby or something other than politics and those are the ones that friends and family read. At least that's my guess.

Posted by: Sarah at March 2, 2004 02:35 PM

Glenn Reynolds?? Oh, you mean The Puppy Blender.

I myself, are partial to Frank J at imao.us

I know what you mean about bloggers though.

Tom

Posted by: Tom at March 2, 2004 02:46 PM

The title of the article is misleading, since the percentage refers to adults *who are online*, which still isn't 100%. And the usual caveats about phone surveys apply. (I hang up when polled.)

Check out the *online* poll results:

http://ww1.usatoday.com/survey/response_question.asp?id=1873&qid=4129

74.1% (355 out of 479 respondents) who answered said that they blog. This is surely skewed because other blogs also linked to this story. 4.18% (20 out of 479 respondents) said "I'm blogging this."

Are bloggers an "elite" or just a "minority"? The former has connotations that the latter lacks.

One argument in favor of "elite" is the fact that Anglosphere bloggers on the whole can write in coherent, grammatical English. If it weren't for blogging, I would grossly underestimate the English abilities of Americans. When I see what *native speaker* university students are "writing" nowadays, I don't even want to wonder what the "writing" skills of people who *didn't* get into college are like ...

OT, but one advantage of MT is the ability to post long comments. No more HaloScan multi-parters!

Posted by: Amritas at March 2, 2004 04:11 PM

Just left this comment at Two Nervous Dogs:

"I agree with you about the number seeming too high, and not just because it refers to the percentage of *adults online*, which is not all adults (I doubt most of my family is ever online - some don't even have computers). I think the number is inflated by people who have heard of blogging and want to pretend they're on the bandwagon even if they're not. People tell pollsters what they *think* pollsters want to hear, not what they actually think (or do!)."

Blogging is a great way to meet people(and to cause your ego to simultaneously swell and wilt!) but is it changing the world? Ignoring the "one person at a time" cliche, the only truthful answer is "no."

Posted by: Amritas at March 2, 2004 04:20 PM

What is it about drying hair in front of the computer? I bought one of those jobs that fits over rollers and inflates with hot air. I have it plugged in the outlet closest to the computer and my morning is timed - get up at 0600, breakfast and hair drying at the computer from 0620 until 0700, then makeup and clothes. I read all my blogs in the morning.

I am apparently evolving into my mother. In spite of the fancy curling irons, hot rods and hot rollers, I am back to the same method she used to dry my hair when I was six years old! (It IS the most convenient, though.)

Posted by: Oda Mae at March 2, 2004 07:37 PM

"I am apparently evolving into my mother."

Except for the blog-reading part, unless she read the newspaper in the morning. I've given up on newspapers now that I'm blog-addicted.

I don't foresee any new advances in hair-drying soon until a nanotech-based method comes out involving microscopic little buggers that "feed" on the moisture in your hair. Sorry if that's a bit gross-sounding, but that's the way I see things going.

Posted by: Amritas at March 2, 2004 08:16 PM

Amritas - blogging changed *my* world :-)

Posted by: Harvey at March 3, 2004 04:49 PM