As an English teacher I never cease to be excited by the potentiality of web based tools that enable my students to write directly online. Brad Fitzpatrick had no idea his personal web-logging program would become one of the most popular tools used on the Internet. After LiveJournal.com was born thousands of Internet users wanted to get a LiveJournal.

Internet users were attracted for a few reasons. First of all, LiveJournal is like writing in your handwritten diary, only you can choose to have others read and comment on your life, choices, and daily happenings. One who joins LiveJournal can write to their own journal, or to a community of users with similar interests. Several options are available when updating a LiveJournal, such as security. Choices in security include public, which is most widely used, and allows anyone on the Internet to view your entries; Friends-only, which only allows LiveJournal users that you list as a friend to be able to read or respond to entries; private, which means only the poster of that may see the entry; with the ability to make entries viewable to “custom friends groups”. One can keep track of their friends’ entries via a “friends page,” which shows the most recent entries, in order, of everyone that the user lists as a friend.

I heartily commend the use of LiveJournal and the assorted range of programs such as Blogger which enable the everyday person to keep a virtual journl.