Thanks Clare Leibfarth for forwarding this article from the Village Voice to me.

Book Smart
Could cyberspace be the novel's best friend? Litblogs take off-and grow up.
by Joy Press April 19th, 2005

Brief excerpt:
"Literati are increasingly turning to the blogs for discussion, gossip, analysis, and a sense of community. Inevitably, publishers have noticed the power of these informal networks to generate word-of-mouth buzz-the holy grail of marketing- and are looking for ways to harness it."

It is an interesting article and definitely a must read for any public librarian or blogger interested in books. What this article did for me was it made me think of other ways library blogs could impact things (books, journals, software, etc.) in the library.

For example: Library vendors and their products.
In my blog, I have written several comments about various products from vendors and whether I liked them, hated them, or was just satisfied with them. (example: Serials Solutions and their products Pros and Cons and Central Search) I have had vendors reply to my blog or email me in response to my praise and criticism (see Peter McCracken, Co-Founder of Serials Solutions response to my Central Search critique) .
Here you have the classic example of how the interactive communication of a blog works and how vendors (just like book publishers) are noticing the power of blogs.