Catalyst is a web design company that focuses on six areas of useability.

Recently they did a study on blogs and were so surprised by the results they sent out a press release.

They decided to test where blogs were going (from a user/design direction) rather than where blogs have been.

The full report is pdf (not what I call usable, but let’s not go there)
They took a magazine blog (BusinessWeek - Well Spent)
It’s a biz blog, and as such isn’t overly cluttered or poorly laid out.
Too much menu, and magazine look to it, but that’s just me.

The three key findings enforced people don’t know how to use a blog.

a) No participant understood the mechanisms associated with RSS/subscribing to a blog – not even the minority familiar with the term “RSS.”

b) Few participants even recognized that they were on an actual blog – and once they did, had a very different reaction to the information presented. ( ed: I wouldn’t have known it was a blog if I hadn’t known ahead of time, it looks like a magazine page)

c) A minority of participants understood how to navigate within the blog itself – with most being confused by areas for recent posts, categories, trackbacks and even the comments and archives functions.

Catalyst may well have chosen a well designed biz blog, but I’m not a big biz blog reader. They concluded:

…broad comprehension is fairly far away – and better design and terminology are essential. All those tested were optimistic about blogs following the test, with many expressing interest or enthusiasm for what had been a new experience. However, few felt that the presentation of functionality and navigation was intuitive, and many wondered why more effort had not been put into education.

I guess that is biz speak for - They didn’t really get it. Designs need to be better and letting people know that: this. is. a blog. might help. Many testers thought - a blog, cool. Most of them didn’t find it easy to use. And companies like Catalyst can probably make a lot of money teaching them what any blogger can.Different people were asked to participate - essentially in the business world and closely related fields.

I don’t know how a blog works either.
These are what biz blog and techs would consider basic blog basics.

RSS subscription mechanisms (XML buttons)
Main page with both full and truncated postings
Landing pages with full postings and comment mechanisms
Previously posted comments
Recent posts
Trackback capabilities and recent trackbacks
Archives
Recent comment logs
Author photos
Author contact information