Patton Hughes - With a blog the writer has all the responsibility. Typically the blogger is stuck creating something more akin to a lecture than a discussion. While the blog may get some responses, its success or failure is based on its content; not on the conversation that it ignites.

Another reason I love forums is that, unlike a blog, I could have stopped writing at the end of the last paragraph. On an active forum that assertion would have been enough to effectively start a conversation that possibly would be just as informative as this column. Certainly it would include the perspectives of two, three, five or ten knowledgeable people, each with an opinion on the subject. PBS