Blogging as a personal tool for expression has waned in the shadow of Facebook, Twitter, and any number of new digital tools of personal mass-communication. Unless someone can blog full-time as a profession or committed hobby it is difficult to maintain steady and meaningful content… making the maintenance of such a beast more trouble than it’s worth.

I have had this conversation with several blogging friends within the last few months. As more and more of our friends and family get on Facebook, for example, it’s much easier to maintain interactive and up-to-date communication with them within Facebook, rather than a blog. And since most folks I know started a blog to (mostly) broadcast happenings to family and friends… well, you can see the conundrum.

Infrequent posting can be minimized by emphasizing RSS feeds. Today, it’s impractical to keep up with more than a few blogs without subscribing to their feeds (for example: here’s mine). Once you have a site’s feed you can effectively “combine” them using tools such as Google Reader into a one-stop shop of all your favorite blogs’ latest posts.

Now, I’m not saying that blogging is gonna fade out very soon. Indeed, the number of blogs on the internet is still increasing. What I’m saying is that – with every medium – there is a natural cycle… and the “personal” blog is waning. The “topical” blog is still a strong format, and won’t be slowing down anytime soon.

As such, I may be turning Negative99 into a topical blog in the near future. I will first – probably – set up my personal website, SteveMooradian.com, to be more of a personal “portal” that will contain a aggregated blog feed, Twitter feed, Facebook feed, Flickr feed, and other details. Whereas my blog, Negative99, will host content directly related to what I’m most passionate about… being a Christ-follower who’s conservative, unashamed, and too discerning for his own patience. I’m not sure exactly when this change will occur… but if you SUBSCRIBE then you’ll be the first to know!

UPDATE: Yes, yes… I figure I’ll keep the flash games up…