The essence of Blogging

On today's Chinese newspaper, there is a mentioning of the blogsphere convention in Singapore. Over 500 participants have signed up for the event. The main organisers seem to be Mr Miyagi, Mr Brown and Xiaxue.
There is a special one-liner that says," there are more bloggers in Singapore who are unidentified yet contributed to the local blogsphere."
That I must agree. A lot of us have kept blogs and made known to only a few close ones around us. Some for the purpose of keeping in touch with one another. Some for pure voyeuristic purpose of delving into another person's world.
I have friends and lecturers who have got to know another occupation better as a result of blogs kept by people in different occupations.
These seems to be great knowledge. But there is a thin line between voyeurism and concern or knowledge.
We may be intruding into other people's privacy.
Another friend of mine who keeps link to his other friends' blogs has this disclaimer or rather warning,"Please ask my friends before reading their blogs so as to respect their privacy."
But who actually heed these warnings?
You may think why I am saying all these.
But what I have to say is this. We do not know the impact of blogging at the moment. Not the long term effects. However, the short-term effects of blogging are showing.
You may have heard of misunderstandings between colleagues and the result is the blogger getting fired.
You may have heard of nude pictures online that made relatives and friends appalled.
I even have lecturers saying dun put anything online not even blogs that may have harmful effects to urself.
But what exactly is harmful? And what is the purpose of keeping blogs?
IF the purpose of keeping blogs is to be a convenient diary, then there is a conflicting interests present. Being true to your diary and protecting yourself from negative effects of that potential post.
Actually, I find that the blog written by someone can reflect the inner feelings of someone quite truthfully. You never know that that dark side of the person really exist or you didnt get to see unless you are close to that person.
But now with the convenience of the WEB, you get to see it. Even though it is text, the impact of their dark side still left quite a bit impression on you.
I didnt know that one of my friends can yell obscenities. I mean my friend wouldnt say it verbally yet he/she wrote it online. So violent words that you cant believe it is from a docile gentle person.
Hard to believe, but it is true.
There maybe even devastating vision that employers may try to search potential employee's blogs to find out about their personalities and psychologies.
Or that the blogs be used as an incriminating evidence in court against the blogger.
I am not being pessimisstic here but nothing is for certain.
No one knows how the technologies will develop. One can predict the technical aspects but never how a person interact with the existing technologies. Coz Man are the ones with intelligence and they have a special way of using things given to them.
So to be truthful in blogs or not, you have to decide for yourself.