As the blogging phenomenon rips across the global web, a Zimbabwean online media group has set up a new blog that is set to add a whole new dimension to blogging in Zimbabwe.
The blog (http://www.zimbablog.com)
Founder of Zimbablog, Fungai James Tichawangana, said that many people are intimidated by the thought of setting up a blog for themselves as this means they have to generate a lot of content to keep visitors coming back and to grow the website. However, on a shared blog, you can write one post a month and you will benefit from the traffic generated by all the other posts. There is no pressure to post something new every day.
Around the world, it is estimated that there are around 200 million blogs (according to http://www.zireport.com). Many of these are not active as the owners are not full time bloggers and thus cannot make posts that regularly.
Initially, only approved or invited people and organisations will be allowed to make posts, but anyone can sign up to the site to participate in discussions and to comment on posts.
Tichawangana added that there are many blogs that have great content but are not marketed. “Generating great content is one thing. Getting people to know about it and to come to the website is a totally different ball game. By signing up to a shared blogging platform the blogger simply concerns themselves with blogging and the marketing of the blog is done by a full time professional. This ensures maximum exposure with minimum effort,” he said.
It is estimated that there are over three million Zimbabweans living outside Zimbabwe. The managers of Zimbablog hope that this platform will assist in bringing the thoughts, ideas and experiences of some of these people together.
The Zimbablog team also has loftier ideals. According to their about us page: “It is said that less than 2% of ALL content on the web is from Africa. It is our hope that by creating collaborative content platforms such as Zimbablog we can work together with thousands of other people to change that strange statistic.”
