Dan, I think people why had blogging on their radar may have given it a try and found out how much work it was in the long haul. I think unless you have a passion to share, blogging gets stale pretty quick. Having nobody read your blog is another way to see it go into a coma — putting in the effort for nobody is pretty tough.

I've learned how much work blogging can be, but I fortunately have passion to keep doing it, and a small readership whom I feel I'm writing for, beyond the core desire to write for myself.

As to coma blogs still being up — I wonder if those bloggers have the romatic idea they will post again "when they have time" but in reality they never do... and the longer it goes the harder it gets. Pretty soon taking down the blog is harder than leaving it up, and there is still that ntion of posting again "someday" that probably factors into coma blogs.

Interesting topic nonetheless. :-)

Building on Mike's comment, as a reader the value of a blog is content. There already exist plenty of sites that point to other things on the internet, but good, thoughtful posts on a topic are rare. I wasn't very satisfied with my content and felt somewhat hampered by not feeling like I could write about certain things (i.e. commenting on art by grantees or hopeful grantees). Which left a lot of "look at this" posts. If I'm going to do that, I'd rather/have been posting pictures up in Flickr.

On the otherhand, creation relies on continuous practice, so dedication to writing everyday is important to maintaining a blog. Writing can be challenging enough without adding little bits of code to make things smoother.

I think blogging could go up again if the collective we can believe that we don't just consume, but can also create.

Thanks for the thoughtful comments, Mike and Sam. I think that the most successful blogs have voice. There are many blogs that start up and flounder -- not having found their voice. I'm sadder though when a blog with voice goes dark, because it's so much more fun to read something written with the audience in mind. In that sense, writing for a blog is more akin to journalistic writing.