Only two divergent views from the marks on dead trees world of ink-stained wretches on the Bloogle. One gets it, the other doesn't.

The Guardian

The news that Google has bought Pyra, the company which enabled the phenomenal growth of 'blogging' (the publishing of online diaries or weblogs) has had the mainstream media in a spin all week. One can see news editors all over the world summoning reporters shouting 'What the **** is going on? What is this blogging stuff anyway?'

The Globe and Mail

The worry increases with Google.com's acquisition of Pyra Labs, which gives a veneer of respectability to blogging — that awful verb formed by the contraction of "Web log," a kind of on-line diary favoured by non-writers and non-thinkers (its slogan is "Push-button publishing for the people").