Mousedriver Followup

I want to do a couple of posts on the question "Why Blog?" this week.  I'll save the list of reasons why I think the whole business about blogs and RSS is important for a post later this week, but let me start with just one experience that has made it worth it for me.

Matt Blumberg and Brad Feld both mentioned the book "The MouseDriver Chronicals" and I bought it and read it.  I really enjoyed it and asked Matt how he happened upon the book - it turns out that someone at his company had met one of the authors and recommended the book to him.  Then I wrote about the book in my blog and in the process went to the MouseDriver website and signed up for the MouseDriver Newsletter. The next thing I knew I was in an email conversation with both of the authors, John Lusk and Kyle Harrison, all because I had mentioned their book on my blog.

I have tremendous respect for authors and it was a great thrill to "meet" these guys and even be invited to meet face to face next time I'm traveling through their towns.  The web has made it so much easier to connect to companies, but I think one of the important aspects of blogs is that it makes it so much easier to connect to other people.  As the web was beginning to explode people worried that society would see personal connections decline, but my experience is just the opposite as I'm connecting with people I never would have met otherwise.