Chad has a post up about Cosmic Variance's move to Discover Blogs. He notes that some people lamenting the decline of the "old blogosphere" haven't been around blogs that long. He doesn't mention that he's been blogging since 2002. So have I. Most blogs have always sucked, that's a constant. Some of the less-sucky ones now have the option of remuneration. With four majorcompetingscienceblognetworks I think you'll get some competition driving quality. Granted, a great deal of blog writing will remain crap; just like a great deal of the media. The laws of the universe have not changed. And the "good old days" were not really that good.... (e.g., the "warblogging era," where I was unfortunately a marginal player).