This is something I have been thinking. I wanted to know how people interact on the web, how people interact with blogs, and what types of blogging types I could derive from that.

From what I can tell, there are people ‘blogging’ in the following ways:

1. Readers

This type of person likes to read blogs and follow what they are doing, but does not interact or have their own blog. This is more of a “newspaper” like reader, or a reader of Web 1.0.

2. Interaction Mavens

This type of person may or may not have a blog of their own, but spends significant amounts of time reading and commenting on other blog posts. They are the type of person who love to interact and create bonds.

3. Linkers

This type of blogger likes to interact, but does so on their own blog. Rather than leaving comments, this blogger will write a post, long or short, linking to the original piece and letting that be their “comment” field.

4. Individualists

This type of blogger likes to break news first, or write something in their own line. They write a majority of original content, and therefore do not send out many links to other bloggers.

5. All Round Bloggers

This type of blogger likes to read and write on what other people have talked about, sometimes putting out original stuff, and sometimes commenting instead of writing.

6. Social Circle Bloggers

These bloggers fall into a heavily social blogging category - they write to share with personal friends and family. These bloggers are heavy Live Journal and Blogger users, and tend to work within the inner blogosphere circle of friendship, rather than looking outside it. They tend to subscribe to blogs of friends and very few others.

7. Comment Attractor

This type of blogger writes in such a way that comments are encouraged, and interacted with openly. This is more of a writing style than a type of blogger, and may mix more or less with other blogger types.

—

So, I am sure people don’t neatly fit into these categories, but it’s been something I’ve been watching for some time. I think I fall into more of the Linker or All Round Blogger types. I don’t comment much and do tend to reblog info rather than use a comment box - with so many blogs, the stuff that interests me usually has some home to go to :)

One of the primary reasons I looked into this was because I was trying to figure out why I was not a social bookmarker or a huge user of social tagging. For me, I find no value in social bookmarking because I do tend to blog most of what interests me. I tag mostly to attract readers to my content, which is a more selfish use of social tagging. I do search tags, but usually to built up my stock of blogs in a niche topic. Anyway, it all boiled down to the same idea - I don’t social bookmark because I don’t comment, and I don’t comment because I blog at such a high volume.

What do you think?

Technorati Tags: , ,