Upon finally reading John Hiler's Blogosphere: the emerging Media Ecosystem, I was impressed at John's willingness to once again stick his neck out in an attempt to figure out the underlying structure of the Blogiverse. John's sketch of the Blogosphere looks like this:

But it's important to understand that John's complex, self-correcting Blogosphere is only a subsystem of a much, much larger ecosystem: The Boutinsphere.

Prepared with PowerPoint. Forgive me, Glenn.

From further out, the Blogosphere can be seen for what it is: A largely self-contained ecosystem-within-an-ecosystem that serves as one of the lesser inputs to the larger, more fun-filled Boutinsphere. Its primary function: To give me something to read when I'm out of new books and it's too early to head over to the Monkey Club.

Studies have yet to determine whether the Blogosphere is a net source or sink of information to the Boutinsphere that surrounds it. It seems to depend on whether or not Cory Doctorow has read Salon yet that day.

Research and discussion on the Boutinsphere will continue at 5pm at the Monkey Club.

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Copyright 2008 Paul Boutin
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