why do people blog?

In a very early post ... Lilia reflects on why she's blogging: it's a way to represent herself, a way to summarize what she is and what she still should be reading - and not yet: a place where she shares and discusses ideas with others. She also blogs to keep a feeling of "coffee table dialog", something I can relate to very much, although I don't like coffee except for it's sweetness IF there's sugar in it.

Dina about why she's blogging:
When i think of what i've gained from blogging, i've made some great friends with whom i can share many parts of my life with. I've also been stunned sometimes at the personal discoveries i've made through the act of blogging - about my own dreams, persuasions and passions, some of which i talk about more openly, others that make me see with new eyes, still others that i maynot be able to consciously pinpoint but that have allowed me to grow as a person. And on the work-front, or professional front - today i have so many options that i could never have dreamt possible before i started blogging and interacting with this community - there's many loose-ends still, yet some clear directions too.

Here Lillia argues for something I myself haven't discovered yet, but am desperately waiting for, as I'm becoming a ever so experienced blogger:

When I work on a paper I often write posts related to it: informal notes that later will turn into formal paragraps, side track ideas, paper summaries or just associations. Next to a good feeling of producing at least something it get's me into a writing mode: switching from blogging to paper writing is much easier then starting directly.

Ton Zijlstra started once a conversation on Conversations, blogs and related musings at Knowledge board - and there are lots of interesting answers there...the one I like most: "blogging is like a loving sexual relationship".
:-)))

Lilia also mentions something about not overflowing others with stuff they are probably not interested in - thats something I never thought of, but in E-mail discussions I've had that sense of drowning quite often, so that's a good point too!

After all this interesting posts on blogs on why people blog I still wonder if keeping a blog could be useful for an anthropologist...in keeping and editing "field notes", links, ideas, snippets of thoughts - whatever. What about people stealing your ideas? And isn't a blog through it's very nature of being public going to influence the way you write about "the others"? Does it make sense to keep a blog in "normal" anthropological research? I mean I do see the point in doing so when one's into "virtual ethnography", but what are the limitations of blogging - are there any?