I haven't been doing hard core research work since I published the 10th DigitalFilipino StatsReport two years ago. However, I must admit that I'm beginning to get inspired once again with all the reports being published as to how the Blogosphere has changed recently. The ground research work DigitalFilipino.com's StatsReport - State of Filipino Internet User Report Part 3 will start soon. As soon as we finalize our supporters list, will start conducting our survey.

According to Technorati's State of Blogosphere Report Part 1 (August 2005), the size of blogs on the Internet is doubling every 5 months. In Technorati's experience, they were monitoring 7.8 million blogs last March. As of end July, this figure surged to 14.2 million blogs. Growth is is seen in Japan, Korea, China, France, and Brazil. At least 80,000 weblogs are created in a day.

The blogging activity is also impressive. At least 10 blog posts are being uploaded every second or 900,000 blog posts a day. (Part 2) Spikes in posting are partly attributed as well by major events. Of these posts, around 300,000 are tagged for proper keyword and categorization. (Part 3)

As there are numerous easy to use blog tools today, lots of stuff to talk about, the blogging community getting to know each other, advocates encouraging are others to blog, are all factors in its acceleration.

In the US for instance, according to comScore Media Metrix, 50 million Internet users are now reading blogs. The report also stated that traffic to blog hosting services has grown significantly. Blogspot.com has more visitors now that the New York Times, USA Today, and Washington Post at more 19 million unique visitors. The top 10 are: Blogspot, Livejournal, Typepad, Xanga, AOL Journals, Blogs.com, MSN Spaces, Blogdrive, GreatestJournal, and Diaryland. The most popular blog drawn by search engine results, therefore having the highest unique hits, is FreeRepublic.com while the most visited blog is the DrudgeReport.com.

Last week, during the iblog Mini: Blogging Gloriagate forum, we partly asked ourselves what will happen next after the issue is settled. Will it lead to downward spiral of blog adoption? I guess in the Philippine context, we have yet to see this. (as if we will run out of political things to talk about)

However, politics and news are seemed to the primary blog driver according to comScore. Stand-alone blogs that focuses on political and news issues are the ones driving the blog traffic, at least 43% are drawn to the non-hosted audience. This is followed by hipster (like Fark), tech (like Slashdot), women (like Wonkette) and media (like MediaMatters), personal (like Kottke), and business (like MarketingVox). Although there's much talk about business blogging, it seems we still have to see how popular can this really get as it is now pegged getting visitor share of only 3%.

Another study by the Pew Internet & American Life Project, "Buzz, Blogs, and Beyond: The Internet and National Discourse in the Fall 2004," cited that blogger audience commands respect as its stands 20% of the newspaper audience and 40% of the talk radio audience. The report also cited that 11 million US Internet users have created a blog.

Perhaps it is true that blogging is currently limited to the elite audience as pointed out by Atty. JJ Disini last week in iblog. The average US blog visitor is not your typical Internet user as they earn more, according to comScore, have more likely to have broadband Internet access, and whose household head is between 18 to 34 years old. This profiles makes them attractive to advertisers as bloggers are heavy Internet users spending an average of 23 hours a week online. 51% of bloggers are also found to be online shoppers.

The Pew Internet & American Life Project cited as well that blogs have buzz as some of the bloggers are now considered as a new force in national politics. It is now being studied as well whether blogs shall constitute the "fifth estate" (the first four are political nobility, knowledge clergy, popular citizenry, press) because of its capacity to generate buzz.

I like to believe that the studies quoted here provide great insights about the global blogging revolution. It's Globalization 3.0 fast-tracked. Are Filipinos ready?