Would be bloggers, new bloggers and experienced bloggers can glean a great deal from this excellent two part series on the genre from elearnspace.org.

Part One covers:

Introduction
What is blogging?
Uses for blogging
Benefits
Implications

Part Two gets into:

Getting Started
Examples
How to blog
Tools for blogging
Extending blogs - aggregating
Conclusion.

Blogs may Pierce the fogs of War
This Forbes article wonders if blogs may be to the next Iraq not like CNN was in 1991 by being a second line of information.

A war in Iraq could be a blog watershed. Just as CNN made its reputation with live coverage from Baghdad, blogs may be uniquely suited to help cut through the fog of war by showcasing diverse accounts and opinions.
“The chief role of bloggers, judging by the Afghan war, is to draw together obscure reporting that didn’t make the mainstream, and also to second-guess dumb news analysis, pointing out what people said that was wrong,” said Glenn Reynolds, whose Instapundit blog (http://www.instapundit.com) is one of the most well-established and widely-read.

No, bloggers won’t be on the front lines. But they could be getting emails from those who are. Or, if they are in the military, they could blog from the region..
There’s more. Read the whole thing.