Are Cisco Blogs Really So Rare?

In a web 2.0 world, why aren’t the networking and Cisco gurus better represented on-line with blogs?

I am building a new e-commerce architecture this week. I have built others, starting before the dot-com boom and bust, but the networking tasks remain much the same, only the tools and some protocols have changed. But one change I expected over the years, and looked for, I could not find.

Where are the Networking and Cisco Blogs?

Don’t get me wrong, there are millions of hits for Cisco on Google. And there are many blogs and magazines that talk about Cisco the business, and an almost equal number that talk about Cisco certification programs. But where are my fellow packet-geeks and wire-heads? Cisco employees are all over Twitter, but where are the blogs of the people actually building the foundation of the new information ecology?

As I am currently building a new Cisco infrastructure, I sometimes need to find out specific configuration answers. But there is so much noise from people selling products, or requiring registration or payment to view conversations, that I rarely search for fore anything without a “site:cisco.com” limiter in my Google search. This limits my results to the cisco.com website and its a much better solution than using Cisco’s search function on their website.

This noise continues in trying to find good network blog sites as well. But I also wonder if the signal is as strong for network engineers as it is for other niche blog categories. I know that in my own case, I was late in starting to blog because I was busy building the networks to carry those blogs. And when I started, I had so many other things I wanted to talk about first. Even now, technology and network communications is only a prt of what this site is about. So I wonder if network engineers do that much blogging about network engineering.

Two Great Blogs to Investigate

That speculation aside, I have found a couple of people and blogs to whom i would like to introduce you.

Jeremy Stretch runs PacketLife.net, and if I ever did a strictly-focused networking blog, I would want it to grow up and look like his. Like many others, I suppose, I found his site because of the awesome cheat-sheets he has available for a variety of protocols and tools, and then stayed because i learn a little more about effective and secure communications with every post he write. Check him out, it is well worth your time.

Greg Ferro runs the EtherealMind.com blog and it is also another treasure. In Greg’s case it is because he takes the time to write about the part of a network communications system that we represent – the humans building the technical systems. As a result, as much as he occasionally dips into the lower levels of the ISO model, he also writes about the rest of what it is like to be a network architect and designer. It is a site that is worth a subscription.

Do You Have Any Suggestions?

But what other signals are out there that are buried by the noise? What other Cisco and network blogs are there out there? Can you help me find some of your favorites?