One of my favorite sayings is: ‘There are lies, damned lies, statistics… and interpretations of statistics”

I added the last bit. And here’s why: two people can take the same data and claim it has entirely different meanings.

And this is what seems to have happened with Technorati’s latest report on the state of blogging. Last week Technorati released its 5th Annual State of the Blogoshpere Report. While it apparently reported that the numbers show that blogging is now mainstream, tech blog ReadWriteWeb saw the numbers as painting blogging in quite a different light.

Technorati says there are now approximately 133 million legitimate blogs, up from 70 million in 2007, and dramatically up from the 4 million in 2004. Yet ReadWriteWeb points out that only 1.5 million (1.1 percent) of those blogs had been posted to in the last 7 days.

Actually, Technorati also says that 7.4 million blog posts were made in the last 120 days. If posting a blog post within 120 days - or 3 months - is considered ‘active’ that would suggest that only 5.6 percent of all blogs are active. And that’s being generous with the word ‘active’.

Why won’t anyone just come out and say it? The vast majority of people who start blogs probably do so with the best of intentions, but just can’t commit to writing blog posts on a regular basis… and then they just give up.

Nothing shameful about that. It’s probably similar to the number of people who start a diary or try to write a novel.

Anyway, check out the ReadWriteWeb article for some more interesting interpretations of the numbers. You can find the link to Technorati’s report there as well.

==> ReadWriteWeb on Technorati’s report

Source: Source: Marshall Kirkpatrick, “State of the Blogosphere 2008: Technorati Numbers Indicate Blogging Is Niche and Slowing”, ReadWriteWeb, September 22, 2008

Wow, a high profile Internet marketer - dare I say “guru” - has lashed out at what she regards as 15 Internet marketing sins.

Sylvie Fortin, president and founder of outsourcing outfit, Workaholics4Hire, and wife of renown Internet copywriter, Michel Fortin, has released a report where she unleashes her rage over a number of tactics commonly used in the Internet marketing niche and elsewhere.

There’s certainly a marketing (list building and sales) motive behind the release of Sylvie’s report. Come on, we’re all marketers, right? But I was truly surprised - and impressed - by Sylvie’s brutal honesty in the report.

Surprise, surprise, a “guru” - who no doubt rubs shoulders with some of the biggest marketing sinners - genuinely lashes out at practices she believes are undermining Internet marketing. I mean really. She even lets loose a few expletives!

Frankly, I would love to see everyone in the Internet marketing niche (and other niches) take Sylvie’s ideas to heart. Regardless of whether or not this is partly a marketing exercise (and heck, I’ve signed up as an affiliate) I agree with her when she says that the fewer people engaged in shady marketing tactics, the better it is for all of us.

Download a copy of Sylvie’s Internet Marketing Sins report here (yep, it’s an affiliate link):

==> Free copy of Sylvie Fortin’s Internet Marketing Sins report

Source: Sylvie Fortin, Internet Marketing Sins, July 2008