So, on remarkably short notice and with absurdly incomplete directions I made my way up to

in LA to attend "Live from the Blogosphere" - an open discussion on the development and current state of blogs and what their roles may be in the future of media.

Why do you blog? How do your behaviors change once you have tasted the awesome power that is blogging? Are there any rules for blogging? What can be done to make blogging better? Blogger's founder Evan Williams displayed a potential new trick/treat that would allow one to call into a central location, type in a password and leave an audio post. It was swell, albeit "experimental."

I stood next to him briefly.

I passed up the opportunity for conversation though since my knowledge of the blogging phenomenon would put me squarely within the ranks of the bandwagoner or the groupie. (You do know all the stuff I link to comes from Boing Boing right?)

Oh, and Evan's company, Pyra Labs, was just bought by Google. That seems huge.

If Google is able to provide an effective search of the world's weblogs then people will have reliable access to unfiltered, yet still relevant, information on a scale and with an immediacy that I have trouble grasping. Talk about democratization of the media. It's enough to give you hope for America.

Well, that and your Mickey Mouse gas mask.

Oh, and for those of you bewildered souls who head to Chinatown in LA to find Chung King Road, well, good luck and godspeed. I drove in circles for a half hour before I found someone who knew what I was talking about and where it was. Not one person, out of the five that I asked, thought I would need to know that it's not a road at all! It's this little pedestrian thoroughfare with galleries and stuff.

How the fuck was I supposed to know that?

Here's how the panel looked from my point of view.

And make sure you visit the reverse cowgirl's blog because the woman who runs it is always posting dirty pictures. She is also 13 feet tall.

Kitty Bukkake wins for most intriguing audience member. I didn't realize that "bukkake" and "shy" could peacefully coexist in the same sentence.

Yes, the blog bandwagoner gets to hand out audience awards. Shut up.

Hopefully I'll erode some of that title with the sheer monstrous force that is this marathon post. I'll keep at it though.