Paper on Business Blogging: "Blogging the Market"

George N. Dafermos has written a very elaborate paper on the subject of Business Blogging (via Many2Many on Corante):

Blogging the Market - How Weblogs are turning corporate machines into real conversations

It has been repeatedly argued that the process/technology of weblogs offers a novel approach towards the continuation of democratic public discourse. Within the boundaries of the firm though, the implementation of weblogs takes a whole new dimension to realising that weblogs are more than the sum of its parts: more than vibrant public forums and frequently updated streams-of-consciousness, alternative forms of publishing and online outbursts of gonzo journalism, and personal diaries. They are the embodiment of online self-organising social systems, are essentially characterised by management decentralisation and ultimately threaten to destabilise current organisational structures and re-invent the scope of management.

Provided that weblogs are not co-opted by rigid corporate policies that aim at stifling the creative spirit that fosters innovation - one of the reasons for having weblog communities at the first place - weblogs can be successfully deployed within the organisation with a pervasive effect across all the stages of the value chain "achieving a greater return on connection from employee, customer and partner relationships". (...)

The paper is available as PDF or HTML page.