Maniacs, all of us

Is blogging declining?  Matt writes:

Laura at Apartment 11D offers an excellent précis
of the ways in which the blogosphere of today lacks much of the charm
of the blogosphere of four or five years ago. I would say that there
are compensating benefits to the new, more professionalized, more
institutionalized blogosphere. But it really is different and the
change has been for the worse in many ways.

Laura links to many comments.  I'm more optimistic.  Very few (if any) of my favorite bloggers have quit and of course there are some new ones.  It's surprising how few of them have quit.  (If blogging is so great, why hasn't competition competed away their returns?  What about comparative advantage in this sector is so persistent?)  The rest of the output you can ignore.