I always find it amusing when somebody tries to jump on a bandwagon without really understanding what is going on.
Case in point, somebody I know is doing an MBA at RMIT (the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology, Melbourne’s third oldest university, and one that one would expect would be fairly hip to the technology jive; after all, “technology” takes up 25% of the non-conjunctive parts of its name).
One of the core subjects for the MBA is Business and Economic Analysis. One of the assessment tasks is to write a weekly blog on a range of topics relating to economics. Except that the blog must be printed and submitted in hard copy.
A blog. Printed and submitted in hard copy.
The word “blog” is a portmanteau of the words “web” and “log”. It’s not referring to this:
It is referring to something like this.
So if a web log is not actually put on the web, and is not in fact ever intended to be put on the web, is it really a web log? No, it is a journal, or an essay, or a free-writing piece, or something. But not a blog.
Why does it matter? Well, actually, it really doesn’t. It’s just an issue of semantics. The amusement factor comes from the fact that this misunderstanding of terminology is coming from a university that is supposed to be pre-eminent in the field.
Shouting at the Clouds 