The internet has revolutionised the way we communicate. E-mail and instant messaging technologies have enabled immediate correspondence across the globe, while websites and chat rooms have brought us a wealth of information and opinion at the click of a mouse.

The latest communication craze to capture the popular online imagination takes things to the next level - allowing individuals to publish their own thoughts to the world from their own site, interact with readers and even, in a few cases, build a cult following.

Blogging usually involves a single person writing regular excerpts in an online journal, or blog (short for web log), that anyone who accesses that web address can read and respond to.

The first blogs appeared more than 10 years ago in the form of online diaries from journalists and techies avidly publishing their thoughts on the newest conspiracy theory or software development. By 2003, when the so-called Baghdad Blogger built up a global following among readers eager to know about the second Iraq war from an insider's perspective, blogging was being touted as "citizen's journalism".

Today, blogs of all varieties can be found throughout the internet, with some of the most popular areas of discussion being around the subjects of hospitality, food and tourism.

Many of these originate in the USA. Hotelchatter.com, for example, has garnered many plaudits for its frank description of hotels, the hidden costs of which guests should be wary, and its gossip on where celebrities hang out. Waiterrant.net, a blog featuring the reflections of a cynical restaurant worker in New York, is now so popular it has started to sell logo-emblazoned T-shirts and coffee mugs from its site.

The UK also boasts its fair share, notably Caterer's own Kitchen Rat, the musings of a hospitality insider, providing chit-chat and rumour-mongering on the UK hospitality industry. There are also numerous food and drink blogs, such as Intrepidgourmet.com and Spittoon.biz, that detail the writers' particular obsessions with the culinary world.

Post a review
But, says François Jordaan at online marketing agency Wheel, these blogs should not be confused with the growing number of opinion sites such as Tripadvisor.com or Eatanddrink.co.uk, which let people post a review of a hotel or restaurant.

"With opinion sites, there is no ownership by one particular writer and no lasting relationship with the reader. People post a comment and then go," Jordaan says. "Blogs are more like an informal online magazine where writers have an ongoing interest in their subject and the opportunity to form a loyal readership."

Wheel believes that UK hospitality companies can use blogs to make their websites more engaging to their visitors. Alongside the usual list of impersonal press releases that usually appear on company websites, hotels or restaurants could include regular updates of tourism in the area, or how the chef is experimenting with particular recipes, all written in a more casual style.

A best-case scenario would see the blog become so popular that people visit the website regularly just to catch the latest posting. While there are no well-known examples of this yet in the UK, businesses in the USA have been doing this for some time.

A good example is Gourmet Station (www.gourmetstation.com), an upmarket food delivery service that has developed a rapport with its customers through its associated blog, Delicious Destinations (www.gourmetstationblog.typepad.com). What is notable about this blog is that the writer uses a fictional character to opine on fine food and dinner parties.

Another blog that might offer UK restaurateurs a few ideas can be found on the website of the Horse Feathers restaurant and bar in New Hampshire. This blog offers recipes and the latest news on local attractions as a way to pull in visitors and keep them coming back.

Common drawback
However, some entries on this blog are overtly promotional, a common drawback that tends to blight many company blogs, according to Catriona Campbell, a director at website design agency Foviance.

This point is echoed by Jordaan, who says that, in some ways, the whole concept of blogging flies in the face of traditional corporate communications. "While blogging offers companies the opportunity to develop two-way communication with their customers, it also poses difficult challenges," he says. "Don't expect all the comments from readers to be positive - some will ask tricky questions - but a good blog won't avoid controversy."

Another important element of setting up your blog is to get to grips with the technology. There are numerous blog services on the internet and they generally fall into three camps.

At the basic end, there are free hosted services, such as Wordpress.com and Blogger.com, owned by Google, which offer you space on their website free and software that will automatically archive your blogs chronologically and provide facilities for readers to post comments.

The disadvantage of these, however, is that you can't use your own web address, because they are simply pages linked to the provider's central website.

More sophisticated are the hosted blog services that you pay for. The most popular of this genre is Typepad.com, which charges about $90 (£47.50) a year. You get your own domain name and, by and large, a more professional-looking site which you choose from a range of standard templates.

More control
The third option is to install blogging software on your own server by downloading it from providers such as Movabletype.com and Wordpress.com. Some of these services are free, others you have to pay for, but the advantage is that you can incorporate these blogs into existing websites and have much more control over their look and feel. The drawback is that this will require a little bit of technical knowhow, but any small web-design company should be able to set this up.

Once you have your blog up and running, it's a good idea to promote it through the various blog tracking services. One place to start is Pingomatic, which will enable you to alert the most popular blog tracking sites, such as Weblogs.com and Technorati.com, and thus the many potential readers, that a new entry has been posted on your blog and people should read it.

There you go. It couldn't be simpler. Now you've just got to think of what to write.

What makes a good blog?
"It's not rocket science. The best blogs are the ones that focus on quality writing," says Elena Berton, a London-based journalist who writes foodie blog http://www.intrepidgourmet.com/.

Berton says her blog is purely a hobby that allows her to indulge her three passions: writing, food and travel. "Some food blogs simply try out recipes and review them," she says, "but others let you get to know the personality of the writer, and those are the ones I keep going back to."

Berton recommends http://www.fireandknives.com/ and http://chocolateandzucchini.com.

At www.just-food.com, a business information website for the commercial food industry, managing editor Catherine Sleep says that a blog can be an outlet for lighter stories which act as an antidote to the "dry and hard facts" of a corporate news report. "I take something in the news and give my view on it," she says.

Sleep says that blogs should be written in an informal style by only one person. "Blog readers expect to get to know the writer," she says. "Corporate blogs written by a team of people don't have the same consistency."

She says her blogging activities have helped raise her profile in the industry but admits: "It can be a double-edged sword when you are required to make regular entries but are sometimes suffering from writer's block."

Wine blogger Andrew Barrow, the author of www.spittoon.biz, also emphasises the personal nature of his blog. "I'm writing to directly communicate with my readers," he says. "I try not to post too much, so I don't swamp them with information."

The legal aspects of running a blog
Hospitality firms launching their own blogs must bear in mind the legal responsibilities that come with publishing, says Justin Ellis, a partner at techno-law firm iLaw.

The laws on libel apply equally to blogs as to any form of advertising or editorial, he warns. If, in a blog, a writer refers to competitor companies, any comparison must be fair and compare like for like.

If you want to reveal that a famous celebrity dined at your restaurant or stayed at your hotel, caution must also be exercised. After model Naomi Campbell's victory in the House of Lords against the Daily Mirror, which revealed details of her treatment for drug addiction, "the law of privacy is in a state of flux", Ellis says.

Issues can also arise if your employees start their own blogs. Should they defame someone or publish confidential data, this could lead to legal action or damage your business's reputation.

Ellis suggests that employers include a policy about the use of blogs in employee handbooks, stating what employees can or cannot write about. "It's a bit draconian to say they can't have a blog at all," he says.

If you invite comments from the web community on your blog and you exercise editorial control over these comments, you will again be held liable for the content that appears.

Ellis warns: "Should you get a complaint about a comment or it appears defamatory, it would be wise to take it off."

www.ilaw.co.uk