Basic blogging questions

Non-reader asks: So... what IS a "blog"?

So I was sitting at the Kissarvik Co-op, enjoying one last meal with friends before three of us fly away to different parts of Mexico... when the topic of my blog came up. I didn't MEAN for it to become a topic of conversation, but it did. I was saying what I was doing in Yellowknife, and one of my friends asked "So, you have friends in Yellowknife?" (somewhat aghast, because if I did have friends in Yellowknife, she'd be sure to know - I'm a talker, what can I say?)

I hemmed and hawed and finally spat out "Well, they are blogging friends"

And they all laughed.

One person even joked, (nearly choking on his french fry, I might add) "are you having a BLOGGING SYMPOSIUM"

My response: Yah, absolutely we are.

Then his girlfriend asks "Okay, but what IS a blog?"

Dun-dun DUUUUUUUN!

I've discovered the only thing more difficult to explain than "I *know* such-and-such a person through their blog" is "What IS a blog."

Because blogs aren't the same thing to everyone who writes them.

Some people write for themselves, and only themselves. These rarely see the light of day, and may-or-may-not include the intimate details of a person's life that they may-or-may-not share with others in their non-digital existence.

Some people write for family: I liken these to a less-invasive mass email update - - I had one of these once, when I was in France.

Some write for a "small" audience: Targeted ramblings like a "Recipe blog" or photoblog...

While others write for a wide audience: I think a lot of the Nunavut Bloggers have seen their blogs reach this category... we started out writing for ourselves or our families... but now we have widened our scope. Now we even write for other bloggers, people looking to move to the North, people who want to live vicariously through our writing...

And that's pretty cool. But it's not an easy thing to explain. Neither is:

"So, what do you write about?"

But that's another post. :P