Our 2009 Blogging Predictions: How Did They Stack Up

It’s the end of the year, and before gazing into a crystal ball and making predictions for the year ahead, it’s only fair that we start the process by assessing how well last years predictions went.

CORRECT: The rise of the uberblogs

This prediction also had its own post here. We’re calling this one correct. Large multi-stream blogs continued to grow in 2009. The Huffington Post went local in a big way, b5media all but dismantled its mutli-blog strategy in favor of large uberblogs, and sites with multiple content streams became the norm (sadly for us, we’ve got way more competitors now as well.) Examiner.com became one of the webs biggest sites.

CORRECT Increased uptake in Commenting 2.0 services

2009 was marked by a huge uptake in commenting 2.0 services as both JS-Kit (now Echo) and Disqus battle it out for commenting supremacy. Notable for the year was the expansion of commenting 2.0 into traditional media properties.

MOSTLY WRONG: Consolidation in Commenting 2.0 services/ acquisitions

Wrong because there were no acquisitions of note in the space in 2009. However, IntenseDebate has slowly dropped off the radar as JS-Kit and Disqus have become the biggest players by a long stretch.

CORRECT: Facebook to become major blog service player

Facebook went from little presence in blogging in 2008 to becoming a major service provider for everything from comments through to logins. Logging into FB to make comments has become common across blogs (with Disqus and JS-Kit supporting FB). With Facebook dropping its walls and opening up profiles to all, expect bigger things on Facebook.com itself in 2010

CORRECT: The traditional blog layout will decline

Nothing major in this prediction as the trend had already started. It’s often harder at the end of 2009 to spot the difference between a big blog and a heritage media site. The magazine style layouts that started the trend have partially given way to a broader variety of non-traditional layout formats.

WRONG: Technorati will be acquired

Predicting Technorati’s acquisition is something I’ve been doing for years and every year it never happens. Technorati has gone from strength to strength this year as it has reinvented itself as an ad network, with even better days ahead (well, we’d hope so, they supply our ads.)

NOT SURE: SixApart overhauls MovableType, becomes a player again

SixApart have launched new products this year, including a microblogging platform based on MT code, so the prediction was partially right. SA from all accounts remains strong, although it is struggling for a break out, huge hit. That said, it probably doesn’t need one to be successful.

WRONG: Widget providers will fall

SpingWidgets went paid only, and other widget providers are struggling. Widgets are definitely falling out of fashion, but there hasn’t been any major falls yet.

RIGHT: Old Media will acquire a record number of blogs

I haven’t kept count, but there has been a number of high profile acquisitions over the year. Most recently, Scienceblogs was acquired. Calling right, but without hard evidence as to whether it was a record year.

NO IDEA: The Inquisitr will become Australia’s largest independent blog by traffic

The fun prediction that is impossible to measure. I know we do more traffic than Problogger (even if we have a lower Alexa rank) but I continue to be surprised by new Australian blogs doing great things, even if I don’t know their numbers. Probably right, but we can always do better.