Is “reblog” a word?

I hope so, because that’s what this is. I am editing (or in my mind, reblogging) my very first blog post that was originally published on our site on March 1, 2005. That’s back when we first launched our site… back right before we released our first wine. It seems longer than 4 years ago.
In March 2005, I struggled to capture with bits and bytes the passion and experience that we wine enthusiasts share. Wine is personal. Whether as part of a big celebration or an intimate evening, a bottle of fine wine adds far more than just liquid refreshment. I thought that a blog would be a great way for me to share our story with you and provide a forum for you to share your’s. Many of our friends old and new wanted to know what it was like to start and run a winery. Well, a lot has changed in the online world in those four years. (A lot has changed in our wine world as well, but we’ll save that for later posts.) Blogs have gone from being a quaint piece of software supplementing a web site to being major media and information sources. The Presidential election of 2008 proved that blogging had gone mainstream — or perhaps I should say Mainstreet.
And now we have Social Media. I’m not sure if anyone can predict where Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, and all their e-kin are headed. I know many folks think of these apps as toys or a waste of time — if you’re reading this, you probably aren’t in that group — and many who think they represent the biggest advance in digital interaction since email. We’ll see. But one thing is clear. Businesses (including tiny wine businesses) ignore all of these new communication avenues at their own peril. A business will risk missing a whole generation of customers if they simply decide that a static webpage, word-of-mouth, and traditional print media will bring success.
On the back of our bottles, we mention that there are stories behind every bottle of wine. With the relaunch of our Vintner’s Journal blog tied in with our new Facebook page, we’re starting a new chapter in our story and a new way of telling it. I hope you enjoy.
I’ll be reblogging (with some edits) several old posts over the next few months.