Blather

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

An editor has expressed a concern that the subject of the article does not satisfy the notability guideline or one of the following guidelines for inclusion on Wikipedia: Biographies, Books, Companies, Fiction, Music, Neologisms, Numbers, Web content, or several proposals for new guidelines.

If you are familiar with the subject matter, please expand the article to establish its notability. The best way to address this concern is to reference published, third-party sources about the subject. If notability cannot be established, the article is more likely to be considered for deletion, per Wikipedia:Guide to deletion. (See also Wikipedia:Notability)
This article has been tagged since October 2006.

**blather**
URL	http://blather.newdream.net
Commercial?	No
Type of site	Community
Registration	n/a
Owner	Dreamhost
Created by	Sage Weil

Blather is a user-contributed content website owned by and hosted on the new dream network (DreamHost). Words link to pages about other words, the difference being that nearly every word is a hyperlink. It serves many functions to its users, poetry and prose workshop, sharing ideas, political debates, or simply a message board. Blather has no implied or explicit purpose. There are no administrators, the people responsible for running the server(s), Sage Weil and Dallas Bethune, do not take a participatory role in the writing or debates.

Each entry is referred to as a "blathe" and to write on blather is "to blathe." Users of the site (although the term is casual, as blather does not require registration) often self-identify as "blatherskites". A username is required to post, and an email address is optional. If a user clicks the name accompanying any given post, all the posts made under that username (or the corresponding email address, if supplied) will be listed chronologically.

The purpose and optimal use of blather is widely debated by its users, but the only formal guidelines offered by the creators on the home page are open-ended: "blather is words. bunches of words, strewn about in a twisty tangly web of pontification, insight and nonsensical delight. but really it's an experiment to see what shape this will take when left at your mercy". Objectively, blather may be most accurately labelled a creative hypertext.

As of 2006, Blather had over 60 thousand pages^[1], consisting of nearly 500,000 user contributions^[2], by nearly 16 thousand unique usernames^[3].

The earliest postings are dated August of 1998^[4], though it's been said blather started in 1996 but was erased and started over.

[edit] Alternate Versions

In early 2001, an alternate version of blather was started, with a dark red background and light red letters to oppose blather's dark blue background with light blue text.

There also exist 2 other versions from 2000, called y2k and bday. These versions date from a previous host and as such no new words can be added, and existing entries cannot be added to.