Raw Data on blog usage

Still looking for some numbers and statistics to use when talking about weblogs? A couple of new resources have just popped up. Perseus has just released The Blogging Iceberg, which mentions the following key points:

When you say "blog" most people think of the most popular weblogs, which are often updated multiple times a day and which by definition have tens of thousands of daily readers. These make up the tip of a very deep iceberg: prominently visible, but not characteristic of the iceberg as a whole.

What is below the water line are the literally millions of blogs that are rarely pointed to by others, since they are only of interest to the family, friends, fellow students and co-workers of their teenage and 20-something bloggers. Think of them as blogs for nanoaudiences.

Nanoaudiences are the logical outcome of continued growth in blogs.

The other piece, released just today, is the Intelliseek/Edelman white paper on blogs. You'll need to register to download the PDF-formatted white paper.

A key point from the Inteliseek/Edelman paper:

Bloggers are speaking and being heard in real time, and only recently has the marketing community begun to grasp bloggers’ impact on brands, business and issues. Because of their speed, bloggers can and do alter the volume and tone of any conversation. Gone are the days of waiting months to get reliable feedback on an initiative. The new reality is this: any blog author with a passion for what you're selling knows what you're doing the minute you do it -- and maybe even before. Bloggers comment immediately, and marketing and business professionals can quickly lose control of the conversation.