Researchers found that 12 million Americans now keep a blog, which represents 8 percent of all Internet users. Compared to that figure, 57 million Americans just read blogs instead of keeping their own, a large increase from fall 2005.

As Shafer believes, most bloggers post because they're looking for a creative outlet. As he sees it, most aren't trying to become Internet reporters or "citizen journalists." Not yet, at least.

"But this study shows that at this early point in the blog era, the great mass of bloggers aren't set on replacing reporters," Shafer said. "The top 100 or top 1,000 may consider themselves 'citizen journalists' of one sort or another, but the survey finds that 65 percent of bloggers don't consider their output journalism at all. They're just expressing themselves in a leisurely fashion, inspired by a personal experience (78 percent, says the survey), and their blogs are a 'hobby' or 'something I do, but not something I spend a lot of time on' (84 percent),"

From a public relations perspective, I find the results very interesting because it appears that, for the most part, the blogosphere is more of a social outlet than anything else for these individuals. Bloggers are talking to one another and encouraging friends and family to see what they've been writing. This word-of-mouth atmosphere is an important one that we'll continue to learn from and see how to successfully work with.

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