So where did all these blogs come from? How did they get from an underground geek toy to a mainstream tool that has revolutionized politics, journalism, marketing and the media?

I always find that when I learn about a new technology or way of doing something online, the geeks have already been there (and I say the word 'geek' with complete affection - I'm one too!). Before business became inseparable from the computer, email or the internet, the academics and tinkerers were there first, kicking the tires and playing with the technology. Blogging was no exception.

Many of the earliest internet geeks wrote online journals detailing interesting links and points of view. As this was before programs like FrontPage and Dreamweaver, everything was done by hand - and that was a huge hassle. Each time you updated the site, you ran the risk of breaking links inside the website and leaving your readers stranded with the dreaded 'page not found' error. Eventually, the computer programmers and web designers became fed up with all of this manual work and created their own software to automate the process of updating their journal websites. Thus the weblog was born.

In 1999, a website called Blogger (

Copyright © 2005 Andy Wibbels

About Andy: Andy Wibbels is a blogging evangelist and creator of the Easy Bake Weblogs seminar that has helped hundreds of small businesses all over the world leverage blogs and RSS news feeds to increase profits and save time. You can download his free special report on business and blogs at