The search engine company with it’s servers and cutting edge technology has taken another step with this acquisition.

Google, which runs the Web’s premier search site, has purchased Pyra Labs, a San Francisco company that created some of the earliest technology for writing weblogs, the increasingly popular personal and opinion journals.

The buyout is a huge boost to an enormously diverse genre of online publishing that has begun to change the equations of online news and information. Weblogs are frequently updated, with items appearing in reverse chronological order (the most recent postings appear first). Typically they include links to other pages on the Internet, and the topics range from technology to politics to just about anything you can name. Many weblogs invite feedback through discussion postings, and weblogs often point to other weblogs in an ecosystem of news, opinions and ideas.

This is good news for Blogger/blogspot users, who will now have a reliable platform to blog on. Google has been in the forefront of recognizing web logs. As with anything, there will be pros and cons. Evan Williams, a creator of the Blogger platform is pleased.

For Williams and his five co-workers, now Google employees, the immediate impact will be to put their blog-hosting service, called Blog*Spot, on the vast network of server computers Google operates. This will make the service more reliable and robust.

Making the most of your blog
Here are some reviews of a new book out: Blogging: Genius Strategies for Instant Web Content.

A couple of discussions about blogging I’ve struggled with is the ‘cream rising to the top,’ and are blogs going to ‘usurp’ big media?

With Google buying Pyra, we’ll see more mainstream media asking the question….What is a blog?
Blogging isn’t going away anytime soon. I linked to a tool earlier this week, that highlights ‘lesser known’ weblogs.
I suspect that media will continue to focus on big time US bloggers, even as they move into the mainstream. ie: Instapundit.
More cream will rise to the top as more people enter blogging.
Blogs won’t and can’t replace big media, and that has been said better by better bloggers than I’ll ever be.

But I see another trend continuing to unfold.
If you have a ‘niche’ blog, and you know your topic, you’ll get noticed.
It isn’t about the number of hits. I used to believe that, but that’s my media background coming out with my media thinking.
It’s about being good at communicating what you are passionate about on your blog.

For example….Bene Diction Blogs On is a meta blog that exists in the sub-culture of Jesus-bloggers. This blog serves this group, by linking other Jesus-bloggers and giving them information about blogging.
Four examples of good ‘niche’ blogs are relapsed catholic, Holy Weblog, Religion News Blog and CaNN.

If you are interested in meta blogging you can subscribe at the side. If you want a post looked at and and linked up, you can hit contact me. You can leave a comment. Blogs also aren’t going away because most of them are relational.

Bloggers like IdeaJoy and JanesBlogosphere provide tools aimed specifically at the Jesus-bloggers. Both these developers are Canadian.
Know any others? There will be other creative technical people coming along to help out and provide. There will be other meta-bloggers connecting up and helping the group. The connecting of the God-bloggers started with St. Blogs and Martin Roth.
Side bars that grew, so to speak.

I’m excited by what I’m seeing on the international blogging scene.
Three of the four niche blogs mentioned above are outside the US, which is blogging’s largest consumer. Ibidem, Jordon Cooper, Living Room, Cre8d, Martin Roth, connexions, looking back…looking forward and MereMadness are just a few examples of blogs gaining notice in the God-blog sub-set. And some of these bloggers are involved in some great projects for the God-blogging community world-wide.

Call Bene Diction a jumping off blog if you will. This blogs hits will never be ‘high’, in the way big media calculates things, or even some bloggers, but it’s intrinsic value to the sub-set of God-bloggers isn’t measurable.
And that’s the point.
Blog on!