Weblogs- or blogs as they are known- is an online website whereby a user can sign up for a free blog platform and start to post on topics that they like. Blogs can be for a commercial purpose (for example: celebrity blogs/shopping blogs) or it can solely be a personal diary for the user.

Blogs came about way back in 1997 where the term ‘weblog’ was thought up by Jorn Barger. Since then, free web host platforms began popping up to entice Internet users to sign up for a blog platform. Blogs were (and probably still are) the hottest thing on the Net right now. It can be aptly said that, “If you don’t own a blog, you’re not cool.” Well, that is in this writer’s opinion, anyway.

With blogs, and more of its kind coming up- video blogs, podcasts, etc- it is not at all surprising that teenagers are taking the opportunity not to be left out and sign up for an account in Blogger or LiveJournal, two of the most popular blog websites on the Internet. According to quarterly reports in 2007 on Technorati.com, it is found that about 120,000 blogs are created each day, which means, at every second that you are reading this article, 1.4 new blogs are made! Isn’t that amazing?

What is it about blogs that makes it so hard to resist? Is it the thrill that you get whenever you update a new post or read a friend’s post online about how they partied last weekend? Is it the interactivity between you, the blogger, and the people out there who reads your blog?

One of the pros of having blogs is the ease of putting up your content onto your blog site. Within a few seconds after clicking the “Post” button, your post will be up in a blink of an eye and is available for the whole world to see.

Other than that, it creates an online portal community between you and your readers where they can comment on whatever topic you have posted up. This is great for young bloggers who like to discuss about a topic related to youths and would like opinion from their readers.

Although it does create a wide circle of social networks for the blogger, sometimes by expressing too much they might risk being in trouble. Youths nowadays are angst-ridden and would post something defamatory about whoever that offended them. In Singapore alone, 4 sedition act cases were reported since 2005. Anyone who is caught with defamation or making racist remarks on their blogs can be jailed for up to three years, or fine, or both, if convicted.

So how expressive can one be on their blogs? Not till to the extent of insulting someone on your blog, of course. So beware when you are putting up a hate-post. That one click of the publish button could very well get you into trouble.