BY CYNTHIA JENSON-ELLIOTT
Microsoft Corp. and San Diego’s Eventful Inc. recently announced collaboration on embedding Windows Live Writer and Windows Live Clipboard into Eventful’s event Web pages, making it possible for bloggers to insert event information directly into Weblogs , Web-based diaries also called “blogs.”
Windows Live Writer is a free, downloadable program, which is part of a set of personal Internet software developed by Microsoft.
Windows Live Writer works with a variety of blogging software and host services and allows users to easily post blogs without a lot of hassles. The Windows Live Writer’s “plug-in” tool allows bloggers to look through Eventful’s Web site, pick out events of interest, and cut and paste to “plug” them into their own blog without having to retype information.
The collaboration will enable bloggers to create links to events they would like to share, without losing data, according to Microsoft’s J.J. Allaire, architect of Windows Live Writer.
In the past, Allaire said such information could only be transferred as text.
Windows Live Clipboard allows users to copy data from one calendar or Web page to another, while Windows Live Writer allows users to control the format of the data. And neither program requires users to have programming skills, making creative and inclusive blogging easier than ever before.
A New Marketplace
The collaboration between Windows Live Writer and Live Clipboard and Eventful is an example of how blogging, made possible by blog-friendly software, is changing the public relations, marketing and social landscape.
David Weinberger, a social Internet analyst who wrote the book “Cluetrain Manifesto” and the blog Journal of the Hyperlinked Organization, spoke of a new wave of consumer choice spurred by blogs in his Oct. 1, 2006 keynote address at the Markt Plein Conference in Maastricht, Netherlands.
The public, Weinberger said, is weary of what he calls the “robotically-trained” voices of marketers, politicians and the media. The public is looking for authentic voices, and blogs fit the bill.
Allaire agrees. “Blogs democratize the way information is disseminated,” he said. “The traditional model of trying to funnel corporate communications through the mainstream press is probably on the decline. More and more companies are communicating through blogs.”
Publishing For Everyone
Blogs are also changing the marketing landscape by democratizing the publishing world, Allaire said. “Blogs allow anyone to set up an online publication. It may be small , for the purpose of talking to their family at the minimal level , four readers. Or maybe a neighborhood is trying to get recycling , an audience of 20. Or maybe there is an attorney who specializes in an obscure area of the law with no incentive for print publication , an audience of 200. Blogging eliminates the friction required for people to publish.”
Windows Live Writer and Windows Live Clipboard make this democratization practical, according to Allaire.
“What our product does is enhance productivity in writing Weblog posts,” Allaire said. “You can do more, insert images, customize how they’re used.”
Blogs are also an increasing force in the direct marketing landscape, allowing companies to reach a small, targeted audience that has been difficult to reach through traditional media.
“Blogs can be niche targeted publications,” Allaire said. “Companies are realizing that some blogs have a high advertising quality. They can reach 3,000 people interested in a particular subject.”
“If you’re in technology and want to reach 10,000 people, you can do that through a publication that reaches 500,000 people with all kinds of interests, or you can target communications to the 10,000 through a blog.”
Two-Way Interaction
Because they are more quickly produced and more rough around the edges than print media, and because users enter blogs at their own initiative, Weinberger believes that the voice of blogs can be more believable to the public than the voice of advertisers. And choice is also key: if readers don’t trust a blog, they can always leave.
“If you want information, you’d rather get it from people you trust , other people with similar interests,” Weinberger said in his Maastricht speech.
Many blogs are conduits for information, encouraging readers to explore other sources of information, and referring them to Web sites of interest. Allaire said finding a blog you trust with lots of good information can be a sort of shortcut to having to search for information on your own.
“Blogs can be a proxy for your own surfing around,” he said.
Weinberger praises this outward-looking blog orientation.
“Blogs refer people to look outside the blog,” he said. “By sending people away (to look at other sites) they are saying, ‘I have the confidence you’ll go away and come back.’ ”
This outward orientation, he believes, is an important message for marketers, particularly marketers stuck in a shut-out-the-competition mindset.
Eventful Chief Executive Officer Josh Stein and Microsoft’s Allaire are boosting business through this outward orientation by putting cooperation and collaboration into their product.
“Eventful is committed to the interoperability of the Web,” Stein said. “We give users the option of submitting an event to several of our competitors. It’s a network of cooperation. We don’t mind giving the listing to a competitor , we don’t have the attitude that they have to fail for us to succeed,” he continued. “If you’re taking time to fill out a form, it is better for you if you can submit it to several sites.”
Voice For The Little Guy
Through the Eventful and Windows Live Writer collaboration, a new voice is appearing in the marketplace, said Esther Dyson, industry analyst and author of the blog Release 0.9: the voice of the little guy.
“The Internet empowers the little guy,” said Dyson. “There are also millions of people who would love to put on a play, or a concert, who don’t know how to reach a market of people.”
Cynthia Jenson-Elliott is a San Diego-based freelance writer.
