[Bedingt durch meinen Skiunfall wurde dieser Gedanke von mir nie weiter entwickelt, ich fand den Gedanken - wenn auch unvollendet - für die Diskussion interessant, also hier bitte:]
In the recent post by Shel Israel in his blog naked conversations dealing with the current dispute on Heide Klum versus her dad he states that he was surprised that
"...the more populated, automated and industrialized Germany lagged far behind France in blogging.We concluded it was a cultural thing, that Germans tended to be private, often keeping their hostilities so close to the vest that they could be mistaken for tattoos."
Looking at the current discussion in the blogosphere they conclude that they have to revise the second edition of their book. However looking at their statement again I doubt that the assumptions are correct. Yes, it might be that the german blogosphere is lacking behind because german blogging culture is different than the French, British or US mentality (although I do not agree to Heiko Hebigs blogging culture tips). But is this really the main reason why blogging in Germany is lacking behind?
Here are a few more hypotheses why Germans don´t blog as much as other people:
1. Hypothese - Distribution of broandband internet lacks behind other european nations?
Looking at recent statistics from broadband development in Europe we can see that DSL and other broandband connections are still lagging behind other european nations. However the true benefits of weblogs in private households really exist if you have an "always-on-connection" to be able to participate in near real time conversations of blogs and to benefit from highly dynamic conversations.
2. Hypothese - Acceptance of online media (weblogs) by journalists / the press as a source of information?
A recent study (May 2005) by Martin Welker for the Weblog book as part of a study by the University of Leipzig showed an increasing interest in weblogs by journalists and an above average knowledge about blogs. However only a fraction of all queried journalists are actively blogging. As long as the german media is not using blogs as a means of multiplying messages to their target audience the usage will be limited. This is just the other way around in France where the Sky radio station offers its audience blogs via skyblogs.
3. Hypothese - The lack of a collective incident in the german blogosphere?
Examples like shopblogger, Heidi Klum vs. Werbeblogger or the Jamba case have not such a high community impact like Kryptonite and other cases within the english blogosphere thus the collective impact for "german" incidents is lower. Interesting to see that werbeblogger tried to communicate to the english blogosphere by translating most of his comments. Thus I state that without a true global german incident that development will lack behind other nations.
4. Hypothese - No REAL prominent german blogger
Thus far there are only a few real well known german bloggers and yet these are no full-time, full-fledged bloggers like their US counterparts. Without a german blog hero (heroine) we will not see such a strong development as in the US.
Although not a quite serious list one interesting thing was mentioned by David in his blog. Germany lacks a German star that is blogging. Wether it be a politician, pop or tv star or athlete. Someone strong enough to attract enough attention to his blog and thus indirectly promoting blogging.
So far my hypotheses. What do you think?
