Among the 10 million blogs tracked by BlogPulse, Intelliseek reports that 31% are active within the last 30 days, 44% are active within the last 60 days and slightly more than half (51%) are active within the last 90 days. "Active" means a new post has been added.
My belief is that the abandoned blogosphere consists mostly of free weblogs powered by Blogger or LiveJournal. This is why - at least in my mind - I trust TypePad and Userland
blogs I turn up through routine Google searches the most. They charge
for their services. People who are paying $100+ a year to blog probably
have a serious passion. This doesn't make them more truthful or credible. Still, I take these bloggers
more seriously because they are putting their money where there mouth
is.
I am not turning my nose up at the free services. Many of the best blogs I read are
powered by Blogger. However, when I turn up old content on freebie blogs via Google, I definitely
hold them to a slightly higher standard than I do others powered by the paid
services.
