• A blog entry is a stub for conversation
  One of the key ways to create a loyal audience for your blog is to create a community of readers who interact with each-other on your blog. This means that your blog entries should be structured in such a way that they start conversations. This means they need to be short and punchy, with a clearly defined point or set of points.

No it isn't. The point of a blog isn't to gather a loyal cadre of readers around you dutifully writing comments. And you certainly should not be writing your blog simply to entice the commenters. And if your readers aren't capable of reading anything other than short and punchy, are you sure you should be writing to them? Think this through. A blog entry isn't some place you create to prompt conversation. A blog is a place where you say something. As for the commenters, they should be writing on their own blogs, where people can actually link to them.

I don't agree with Mr. Downs here.  I don't think Vincent is saying that you should write for the benefit of comments - I agree with Vincent - The goal of most bloggers is to inspire, educate or motivate.  The hope is that your words will inspire discussion, debate, different points of view, not just get more comments.  Otherwise your blog is just a journal of your thoughts and there is nothing wrong with that at all - I have one of those but it's private.  I don't want comments on my inner most feelings and I am not sure if I even want it to be seen by anyone.  However - on the blog you are reading now - I do not feel as if I have all the knowledge and ideas myself - I believe that brainstorming and discussion feeds the brain and helps you grow as a person.  Just my thoughts - and yes you can share yours!

• Think about the perspectives of your audience
  Getting the audience talking means you have to consider what their perspectives may be on the point you are blogging about and position your point accordingly. It doesn’t make sense to waver from one point-of-view to another in your blog entry unless that’s the point you want to make.

So, like, if you have conservative readers, you should position your posts around their perspectives, making sure (of course) not to actually state their perspective. If you are going "huh?" that's because this is really bad advice. Why should I align my writing to my readers' perspectives? Why shouldn't I waver around, consider different points of view, examine things from all sides. Sure, it makes it more difficult for these same conservative readers to respond with the snappy comeback that makes them read you day after the day. As for the rest, though, they appreciate the fact that I don't treat readers like morons. I mean, sheesh. One point of view?

Wow, I totally did not get out of Vincents writing what Stephen did.  It is good advice.  What I take from Vincent is that you should should have a solid foundation on your OWN point of view.  You shouldn't waffle back and forth in your stance, it is confusing to your readers and undermines your own credibility.  However, if you don't know where you stand on an issue it's okay to say that - and hopefully your readers will interact with you, provide their points of view on the topic to give you a better understanding. If you blog about your own passions then you shouldn't have any problems.

• Write tight headlines that encourage interest
  Remember that many readers will be scanning your RSS feed along with many others, so the poignancy of your headline is critical. If the headline doesn’t grab a reader’s attention there is little likelihood they will click on it. (thanks to Colin Daniels for this one)

If the whole point of your blog is to attract readers, then you'll have to bait-and-switch them with catchy (but ultimately misleading) headlines. Like, say, Sex Up Your Blog. For the rest of us, though, we know that our readership will be looking at more than just the headline, though if they need some way to decide, ourinformative and straightforward headlines will give them a good guide.

Again I totally disagree with Stephen - I don't think that is what Vincent is saying.  Take this post for example - the headline is "What's the point of blogging"  I am hoping that is interesting enough of a headline for you to read it.  If the headline was "Post #34" or "Tuesday", well that's a little boring and it doesn't capture the passion of the article.

• Make points or lists and make then scan-friendly
  Online readers don’t like to read long columns of text unless your content is extremely compelling. A better way to get a series of complex points across is to create a list of key points that readers can scan, along with a description of each point. This will also help you structure your thoughts in a way that seems more lucid.

Well, you could write compelling content. Barring this, however, you will have to give ways for readers to comment on your posts without actually having read them. Of course, you are doing this at the expense of actually creating an argument or an explanation - short pithy descriptions are all you can manage. The rest of us, though, address readability issues with good design and leave the writing to take care of itself by writing deep and compelling content rather than tripe.

Writing for the web is different than writing on paper.  Our eyes and brains absorb the information differently.  Lists, short posts, are much more visually interesting - it's just a proven fact.  It's really difficult to read a huge block of text on the web no matter how compelling the topic.  When I come across things like that then I print them out and read them later - However with ink prices and all the clutter around - I rarely do that any more.  I say keep your posts visually pleasing.  

• Link to the context
  If you are blogging about something that other people are talking about, provide links to their conversations so you don’t seem to be speaking out of context. Linking to other sites is a plus rather than a minus because it will help your readers understand where you’re coming from.

Most people link to web pages and posts, not contexts. Of course, what the author means here is that you should link to the posts you're responding to. But he won't say that, because then you might have to link to sites that disagree with you, giving them Google juice and all that. To heck with it. Link to the source and let Google (and your readers) take care of the rest.

Again I disagree with Stephen.  I am not going to make you search for the text that I am quoting.  I want to provide you with all the resources you need.  I link to the text or the post most of the time.  Unless I am referring to an entire site, like Twitter or Facebook.  Just my humble opinion. 

I had to break this up into two separate posts.  It got too long and I got distracted - please come back for the conclusion tomorrow - or the next day!  

Thanks, 

Twitter Fairy