What Is Technical Blogging?
The most generic definition of blog (an amalgamation of the words web and log) is a site that contains a series of posts organized in reverse chronological order. This sterile definition doesn’t quite convey what people really think when they hear the word blog though. In the collective mind, blog often calls forth a picture of a writer in pajamas,talking about his or her daily life or (at the other end of the spectrum) breaking news stories before the media reaches them. Yet those two are by no means the only kinds of blogs on the block.
Many of the concepts we’ll explore in this book will be beneficial to those who are interested in starting such a personal blog; however, our focus is specifically centered around technical blogging.
A technical blog is a nonfiction blog, the main subject matter of which is technical—rather than personal—in nature. Generally you won’t delve into what you had for lunch or include pictures of your newborn nephew. Instead, you will use your blog as a way to share your expertise with others in your field. Examples of some of the most popular technical blogs you may already
be familiar with include TechCrunch, Gizmodo, VentureBeat, Smashing Magazine,
Joel on Software, Signal vs. Noise, and Coding Horror,1 to name just a few.
As a developer and entrepreneur, I imagine my ideal readers to be developers
and technically-minded entrepreneurs who are blogging about software
development and business-related subjects, respectively.
Fitting into one camp or the other is not a requirement though. You may be
launching a blog about biotechnology, dentistry, or photography, and the
content of this book would still apply to you.
