Blogs

A. What is the difference between a blog and a book?
Blogs give much more liberty and don't really have a specific structure while books are rigid and uptight and must follow certain rules and guidelines. Blogs also assume that the reader knows what one is talking about and just forms a discussion or comment without giving much background information while the book tends to explain much more and give more details. Blogs also show the exact time and date when it was posted and are easier to find. A person that posts a blog does not have to be famous or well known to get others to read their piece, they just post it on the Internet and open the opportunity to see it to everybody, books instead usually have to be famous or well known for many people to read them.

B. How have blogs changed recently?
In the past, blogs used to be only a Link and a few comments on it. Now, however, it offers longer comments, conversations, and discussions and people write down their opinions and their own conversations. Also the writers tend to get more "personal" and write their opinions and beliefs and express their feeling towards a specific topic.

C. Why might you read a blog?
I would read a blog to see other people perspectives. By reading a blog I get involved in a kind of discussion group and get to learn what other people think about a certain topic and that way I get to compare their opinions with mine and i get to understand, agree, or disagree what they have to say. Reading a blog can also give me like a heads up on a topic that I am about to learn or it can also help me get to understand topics I didn't really know about.

D. Is there reason to doubt the objectivity of a blog? Why? Why not?
Yes there is a reason to doubt the objectivity of a blog. One must understand that when you read a blog you are reading a certain persons beliefs and opinions and therefore the person is expressing his point of view and the perspective of the work is not neutral. Even the comments made afterwards are each going to express a position and therefore, one, as a reader, has to be careful and aware that one is reading an opinion and not a fact and that one can use it and interpret it for personal benefit and gain but always remember that it is not an absolute truth.

E. Identify three blogs that mention our summer reading.
Dante's Inferno:
http://fineartamerica.com/blogs/the-divine-comedy-and-dantes-inferno.html
George Orwells 1984:
http://thepenguinblog.typepad.com/the_penguin_blog/2008/04/it-was-a-bright.html
Aldous Huxleys A Brave New World: http://sciencefictionbiology.blogspot.com/2008/09/aldous-huxleys-brave-new-world-is.html