Authority - Part 1

I finished Naked Conversations and experienced a few epiphanies in the final chapters. The first surrounds the idea that the two most fundamental rules for blogging about a subject are passion and authority. Regarding authority, Shel Israel and Robert Scoble give the example of Bob Lutz's blog on p. 51. Bob is the GM Vice Chairman and author of the Fast Lane blog. So for about 150 pages, I'm thinking that there isn't much opportunity for blogging in the geospatial realm because not many people are in a similar position to Bob Lutz. Yesterday I figured out that authority on a subject doesn't come from a title or position. Rather it comes from insight and understanding. It's the old, "knowledge is power" thing. It's the reason a blog can pop up and gain an instant following such as Drkside of GIS as a recent example. Up to this point, we hadn't heard from a Java programmer who wasn't a geo-geek. OK, so authority in the blogosphere comes from really knowing the subject at both the conceptual level and the nuts-and-bolts level. More about this in future posts. Gotta run, it's the weekend.