Characteristics of Blogs: "...the discrete post as fundamental organizing unit; date- and time-stamping of posts; the appearance of posts in reverse chronological order; hyperlinking to external sites; the archiving of posts and references to posts with permalinks and trackbacks; the reference to other likeminded or otherwise interesting blogs through the provision of a blogroll; the capacity for reader comments on posts; and the organization of posts by keywords into separate browsable categories" (Morrison 1).

What they are useful for: Blogs can be used for a variety of different things, such as news, personal interests, and journaling. They can be used for anything and everything you want since they website is owned and operated by you!

How blogs are a distinctive type of writing: They are extremely "hypermedia". That is to say, they are comprised of text, pictures, videos, comments and thoughts on media throughout the interweb, and just about anything you can embed into your blog.

Blogs can be an effective extension of classroom learning by providing opportunities for students to learn from an outside source, but more importantly from each other.