Some more Katrina-related blogging stories:

• Washington Post: Blogs Provide Storm Evacuees with Neighborhood-Specific News
  
  
• eWeek: An article about Michael "The Interdictor" Barnett (whom we covered earlier): Former Green Beret Stays Online in Katrina's Wake
  
  
• San Diego's North County Times: Web Sites Come of Age in Times of Trouble
  
  
• Ernie the Attorney is the blog of a New Orleans-based lawyer. Ernie has evacuated to Houston, where he's been posting a number of Hurrican Katrina-related entries.
  

He's been at it for a month, but just in case you hadn't heard, The Donald has his own blog, called -- as one might expect -- The Trump Blog. Its subtitle: "Ideas and opinions from Donald Trump and his circle of experts". As Jupiter Research's Michael Gartenberg says, this means that blogging is pretty mainstream now.

From an article on the Australian Broadcasting Corporation's site:

Blogging is helping students to think and write more critically, says an Australian researcher, and can help draw out people who would otherwise not engage in debate.

These are the preliminary findings of PhD research by Anne Bartlett-Bragg, a lecturer at the University of Technology, Sydney, who has been using weblogs or blogs in her own teaching since 2001.

"[The students] are thinking more critically," she says. "They are learning to be responsible and they're communicating outside the boundaries of the classroom and the institution, and they like that."

The most fascinating blog to emerge from Hurricane Katrina is Michael "The Interdictor" Barnett's blog, in which he documents what's happening in New Orleans from the 10th floor of a downtown New Orleans building. Barnett is the "crisis manager" at the domain name registrar DirectNIC, which shares its space with its sister company, Zipa, and in a prior life, he was a soldier in the U.S. Army Special Forces seem to have served him well. He's been helping keep the company's servers up and running since the start of the storm last week and blogging about his experience. It's a fascinating read, and I suggest you read it from his first Katrina entry, which simply reads:

Hmm. This could actually be a nasty storm.

Wired has a short piece on Barnett.

HoustonChronicle.com: News, Rage, Needs in New Orleans blogs.

ZDNet: Bloggers Record Katrina Destruction

Slate: Into the Breach

BlogCritics.org: Blogging Katrina

Marketing Vox: Websites, Blogs Fill News Media Void Left by Katrina

Reuters: Web is Bulletin Board for Katrina Victims

This blog, along with the others for which I write (The Farm, IndieGameDev, The Adventures of Accordion Guy in the 21st Century) is joining with Instapundit, The Truth Laid Bear and several others in the Hurricane Katrina Blog for Relief Day drive. If you're reading this blog, the chances are that you're probably able to spare even the equivalent of your lunch money.

How badly off are people there? According to this blog entry by author Cherie Priest (I got the link from the Neilsen Hayden's Making Light blog), quite badly off.

There are a number of charities from which to choose (here's a list from FEMA, the Federal Emergency Management Agency). Choose the one you think appropriate. I'm sending my money to the Canadian Red Cross, who are sending aid and accept tax-deductible donations from Canadians). If you're in the United States, the American Red Cross will take your donations.