Smell The Coffee:
Got your wireless blog yet?

by brad smith
February 4, 2002

After e-mail, the best thing about the Internet is the massive amount of information that’s available on just about any subject. If you’re an information junkie, the Net is heaven on earth, making available in minutes what might otherwise have taken days or even months to find.

One of the emerging phenomena on the Internet–which also is spilling over onto the wireless Web–is a grassroots communications system called Weblogging, or simply blogging. It already is being used with wireless data connections such as 802.11b, short messaging service and e-mail.

A Weblog is a type of online, hosted chatroom, usually devoted to a specific subject the host wants to discuss. When you think about Weblogs, think “short essay.” The host usually leads off a discussion by posting his thoughts on an issue of interest. Among the most popular Weblogs is one hosted by San Jose Mercury News columnist Dan Gillmor, who writes a biweekly column for the newspaper and also maintains an interactive Weblog devoted to technology issues that he updates almost daily.

So what does this have to do with the wireless Internet?

First, a few Weblogs are devoted to wireless communications. The first may have been one put together by Glenn Fleishman in Seattle to present his news and his opinions on 802.11b and other WLAN technologies. In addition to his discussions, he’s posted a wealth of information about Wi-Fi networking.

Alan Reiter, head of Wireless Internet & Mobile Computing, also has several Weblogs, including ones about wireless Weblogging and another where he offers his thoughts on current wireless data events. In one Weblog, Reiter refers to an incident last year involving Doc Searls, senior editor of the Linux Journal, and consultant Craig Burton, in which the two used Wi-Fi to blog during a Jabber.com conference in Colorado.

“Craig, to whom I sent an e-mail asking about the Wi-Fi blogging, was nice enough to reply that Doc and Dave (Winer, a Weblog founder) were blogging about each other blogging,” Reiter says. “Craig noted how one of the Jabber.com participants sitting in front of him was viewing his photo on Craig’s blog, which Craig posted that morning.”

Right now, Reiter says, wireless blogging may be for elite insiders, but he thinks it can be powerful. Blogging could be used at conferences–perhaps CTIA Wireless 2002 in Orlando, Fla.–for conference speakers to communicate directly with attendees during a panel discussion.

The second significant thing for wireless is that, besides 802.11b, Webloggers also use SMS or e-mail to update their blogs or respond to other people’s Weblogs. The software developed for Weblogging allows a host to set up the blog so it goes out to an e-mail account, grabs e-mail messages with a particular subject and posts the e-mail (or SMS via e-mail) on the blog. Users need to have a separate e-mail account for these messages because the software erases all the e-mails in the account.

Blogs and the old bulletin boards on the Web are somewhat similar, but Reiter thinks Weblogs have more power and potential impact. “These combine coolness, fun and value,” he says.

“A lot of these people are techies, but anyone can use this stuff. It’s kind of a personal journal,” Reiter says. “All the tools are out there and within minutes (after downloading free trial software) you’ve got a Web site.” [WIM]

Brad Smith is IP/data editor at Wireless Week. His column is a monthly feature in Wireless Internet Magazine. He can be reached at bsmith@cahners.com