Like clockwork, a gaggle of media experts rush every year, usually at this point in the calendar, to declare the death of blogging. Such was the case in a recent article in Wired magazine titled “Twitter, Flickr, Facebook Make Blogs Look So 2004.” The key quote:

“When blogging was young, enthusiasts rode high, with posts quickly skyrocketing to the top of Google’s search results for any given topic, fueled by generous links from fellow bloggers. In 2002, a search for “Mark” ranked Web developer Mark Pilgrim above author Mark Twain. That phenomenon was part of what made blogging so exciting. No more. Today, a search for, say, Barack Obama’s latest speech will deliver a Wikipedia page, a Fox News article, and a few entries from professionally run sites like Politico.com. The odds of your clever entry appearing high on the list? Basically zero.

“That said, your blog will still draw the Net’s lowest form of life: The insult commenter. Pour your heart out in a post, and some anonymous troll named r0rschach or foohack is sure to scribble beneath it, “Lame. Why don’t you just suck McCain’s ass.” That’s why Calacanis has retreated to a private mailing list. He can talk to his fans directly, without having to suffer idiotic retorts from anonymous Jason-haters.”

The article does make some sense in that a single blogger, such as myself, can’t keep up with a site in which a team of two or three dozen writers are putting up 30, 40, or even 50 posts a day. And, like BL Ochman, an always supremely savvy media consultant says, few, if any, readers can manage to keep up with the pace in reading that many posts per day. What Ochman says, and I second that strongly, is that committed, conscientious bloggers will write and post when they have something to say or share. That is certainly what I have been trying to do with the blog, especially in generating original content. And, gradually, I’m beginning to augment the blog posts with other features, including a few new ones that will be soon regularly available at The Selective Echo.

As for the state of blogging, there is empirical evidence to suggest that the form is indeed doing well, especially against social media networks, when it comes to influencing consumer purchases. San Francisco-based BuzzLogic, a social media analysis company and ad network, collaborated with Jupiter Research (a division of Forrester Research) to uncover changing behavior around blog discovery and consumption, how blogs factor into consumer purchase decisions and the nature of blog influence on buying behavior.

Their findings contradict the Wired article’s assumptions. According to the survey of more than 2,000 online consumers, one in five general blog readers (defined as consumers who have read a blog in the past 12 months) use blog links to discover new blogs. Further, the study suggests blogs are not consumed in isolation, but experienced as part of a connected conversation — nearly half (49 percent) of blog readers and 71 percent of frequent readers read more than one blog per session.

In particular:

Links more powerful than search: For frequent readers, links beat search as a navigation tool: 38 percent said blog links were the top tool for discovering new blog content as compared to 34 percent who voted for Web search.

Links signal trust: For frequent readers, blog links appear to have similar impact as a trusted recommendation from a person (a response from 39 percent of survey participants).

Blog search not yet mainstream: Blog search engines received the lowest ranking from respondents: 6 percent of general readers and 11 percent of frequent readers say they use these tools to discover new blogs.

Half of the respondents said they use blogs for purchase information. Because they trust blogs for content more than what is available at social media networks, respondents said they look for blogs with a niche focus and topical expertise. In fact, readers are increasingly looking for blogs and purchase information dealing with media and entertainment, games, toys, sporting goods, travel, automotive, and health.

According to the study, blogs factor in to critical stages of the purchase process, weighing most heavily at the actual moment of a purchase decision. When it comes to respondents who said they have trusted blog content for purchase decisions in the past, more than half (52 percent) say blogs played a role in the critical moment they decided to move forward with a purchase.

For frequent blog readers, ads on blogs are on par with sponsored search results, one of the most prevalent and successful forms of advertising on the Web, and trust of blog advertising exceeds that around social networking site advertising. Twenty-five percent of these readers say they trust ads on a blog they read; paid search links also accounted for 25 percent of the responses. Nineteen percent say they trust ads on social networking sites.

“For a portion of Web users, blogs rival search as a navigation tool, which has really interesting implications for advertisers,” said Rob Crumpler, CEO of BuzzLogic. “Blogs are becoming trusted guides, steering users who are seeking very specific information to places of interest online. Being able to identify where this is taking place across the blogosphere gives us a window into user intent and a means to better target advertising to a qualified audience. This is great news for advertisers looking to maximize value in today’s environment.”