The parade man of the blogger scene

 
Internet Roman Hanhart is a passionate blogger. He wants to make the subculture more attractive to the masses with blog parades. 
Roman Hanhart is tormented by society's changing values. He wonders what home means to him. Is it just him? To explore the concept of home and its meaning, he writes an article on his blog and calls on the web community to go in search of home. The call generates an echo. Within four weeks, other bloggers from Switzerland and abroad wrote articles on the topic. Hanhart accompanies the process, links the texts and summarizes them on his weblog. In the end, more than 30 comprehensive articles and authentic texts were published. Hanhart is satisfied. And so is the blogosphere.
This "brainstorming" has a name: Blogparade. The term is relatively new in the German-speaking world. Originally, such events were known as "blog carnivals". The concept originates from the English-speaking world and is called "Blog Carnival". The exact translation did not last long. In a vote in spring 2007, the blog community agreed on the term "blog parade".
The idea is very popular. For a long time, such parades were only held in the USA, but today German-speaking bloggers also launch blog parades practically on a weekly basis. In Switzerland, however, they are still very rare. Alongside Roman Hanhart, Reto Stauss from Nachhaltigbeobachtet.ch also regularly organizes blog parades.
The motives for organizing or participating in such joint campaigns are completely different. While Roman Hanhart is interested in the diversity of contributions on the subject of home, other bloggers want to prove themselves with good texts. The advantage of the parades is obvious: entire topic dossiers are generated within a certain period of time, thoughts are bundled and contacts are made. "As the initiator, you can control the process and tell the participants exactly what you expect," says Roman Hanhart.
Mobilizing parade participants is not complicated. On the contrary. As can be seen from the relevant Parade directories, 30 amateur copywriters can be recruited for a project within a very short space of time. Depending on the topic - the IT sector is popular - hundreds of bloggers contribute. "Many of the texts are extracts from long deliberations and discussions," says Hanhart. The fact that the posts sometimes take on bizarre forms is not a problem for Hanhart. This ultimately reflects the blog culture, which is deliberately diverse and not always comprehensible.
Although many blog parades shine in terms of content and offer their initiators added value, they are coming under increasing criticism. It is predominantly top bloggers in the scene who boycott such campaigns because they see abuse behind them. The accusation is that blog parades are started in order to generate better search engine results, higher traffic and therefore higher advertising revenue by linking to other bloggers. Roman Hanhart finds such accusations justified in individual cases, but not as a rule. "The majority of blog parades are interested in knowledge and not in good rankings on search engine pages."
Aiming for a new imageHanhart's parade has another purpose than just creating a sense of home. The computer scientist from St. Gallen wants to use blog parades to organize the scene and help it gain a new public image. He has been observing the development of the blogosphere closely for some time. His conclusion: it offers hardly any relevant content. Many entries are meaningless to the masses. "With the blog parade, I want to call on bloggers to produce their own interesting content," says Hanhart.
He describes himself as a community person who wants to move forward collectively. He has a mixed relationship with the Swiss blogger scene. "There are far too many individualists who don't create anything new, but always pick on what already exists." The blogosphere needs a new identity if it wants to be taken seriously. He does not want to accept the idea that bloggers only deal with topics on the surface. "Our environment is not only biting, but also creative."
With his statements, Hanhart is regarded by many bloggers as a provocateur and lateral thinker. But that doesn't bother him because he cares about development. At the current blog camp, Hanhart wants to shake up the scene and point out the shortcomings. He already did this in March, when the community met on the ETH premises. In a lecture entitled "Community in the blogosphere - opportunity or hype?", he called on bloggers to organize themselves. His vision: to organize 100 to 300 blogs together in an association and ensure quality. Hanhart wants to present a united front to the outside world and put the focus back on people. Organized in this way, it would be easier to clarify legal protection and copyright issues, work to improve the language, and the scene could market itself better. "There's nothing wrong with bloggers earning money with their content on the side," he says. Above all, Hanhart wants to promote marketing, as it guarantees good quality texts in the long term.
It remains to be seen how his ideas will be received by local bloggers. "I expect fierce resistance from the dinosaurs of the scene. But we all know what happened to the dinosaurs."
Christian Lüscher
Blog paradesBlog parades
are held all over the world. In Germany, the website blog-parade.de provides comprehensive information. In the USA, blogcarnivals.com provides information. In Switzerland, the website blogclub.ch, whose founder and operator is Roman Hanhart, is the central point of contact. In Switzerland
is launching a blog parade on the topic of blogging on October 26. The campaign will run until December 3. Information can be found on the web at blogpraxis.ch. (cl)Roman Hanhart on keywordsSwiss bloggers:
"We learn and find our position in the media and in the economy. This requires a strong community, perhaps an association or club. "Schweizer Medien:
"Unfortunately, many small offerings have disappeared from the print sector." Internet:
"A chance to finally deal with each other responsibly. But we have almost missed this opportunity." (cl)