Comparing and Contrasting Blogs

A web log or blog is defined in Merriam-Webster’s online dictionary as “ a web site that contains an online personal journal with reflections, comments, and often hyperlinks provided by the writer.” (Merriam-Webster). Blog’s are increasingly popular to many Internet users because of its up to date information and details that cannot be covered on the mainstream media. There are variety of topics on blog, this include topics on sports, business, technology, environmental issues, politics and entertainment. To have a better understanding what a web log is and what types of blogs are out there, I have chosen 2 blogs that focuses on the housing crisis in the United States. The first blog is called “Market Ticker”, created in April 2007. The writer goes by the name of Genesis. The second blog is called “Housing Panic Blog”, created in November 2005 by Keith Brand. Here I am going to compare and contrast about these two blogs: the difference in the layouts, how they post their views, the purposes and important issues they bring up to the readers, and whether or not the two writers achieved on what they have done so far.

At first glance of these two blogs, the layouts are clean and the paragraphs are easy to read. Both of them use the online video to fill in the information and pictures to make their blogs more interesting to read. Moreover, they are not part of a large website. These are individual webblogs. Looking at them closely, Genesis has a yellow brownish background and black and gray for the wording. Links are organized in a way that the links are on the left hand side of the blog and paragraphs on the right. He posts once a day and these posts tend to be long but use graphs to make it clearer for readers to understand. On the other hand, Keith has a white and light gray background with black and blue wording. He has more random links on the right hand side of the blog and paragraphs on the left. Interestingly along the links, there are some business news in and some commercial links as well. He usually posts 3 times a day. These posts are short but utilize pictures to make it interesting and sometimes humorous.

The big difference between 2 blogger is that, Keith is more engaging with his reader. Keith asks question about what the reader thinks on certain agenda and sometime has people vote in the comment column. On the other hand Genesis does not have a column for the readers to leave a comment.

Both blogs are subjective, uses first person to write their paragraphs and do not sound like journalists. Genesis is writing the blog from one investor's view of the financial markets with a focus on both current headlines and longer-term analysis of economic trends. His posts reveal that he is very knowledgeable with statistic numbers in the business world. He gives out a lot of opinion of his own according to the statistic numbers he has and is very confident in what he knows. Keith, on the other hand, is more subjective than Genesis because of his word choice. Some of his post contains swear words, and very emotional at times. Like many other bloggers his posts do not reveal much what he is doing for life. He posts his paragraphs with an attached news links so that readers can review themselves. And just like Genesis, Keith also gives his input on the news headlines.

The purpose for both blogs was keeping the readers aware the terrible situation the United States was in. Keith in his early post from November 8th 2005 warned, “Http://HousingPanic.Blogspot.com has launched today in order to allow Americans (and the world) to understand the issues and repercussions associated with the ongoing bursting of the worldwide housing bubble.” (New Housing Panic Blog Will Allow Readers to Understand and Comment on Magnitude of Current Housing Bubble, Housing Crash) When the media were discussing how much impact the housing crisis will have in beginning of 2007, Genesis was reassuring the readers how severe the US economy was in. In an April 1st 2007 posting on housing crisis, Genesis writes, “This doesn't rival the 1990 Tech Bubble - it radically surpasses it!” (More (yeah, I know) on The Housing "Crisis")

Keith and Genesis clearly knew well what was going on. It all started when the dot.com bubble crashed. To keep the economy from falling into a bottomless economic situation, The Federal Reserve Bank (the fed) had to reduce the short-term interest rate significantly from 6.5% to 1%. (Wikipedia) This was an opportunity for people looking to buy a house because they could borrow money at remarkably low rates. According to Wikipedia, between 2000 and 2003, the interest rate on