For those of you who think that the “blogosphere” is primarily a cacophony of partisan political bickering, some surprising news released yesterday might change your mind. The Center for Excellence in Journalism released its Fourth Annual Report on American Journalism, titled The State of the News Media-2007. The report examines “citizen media” trends, including the motivation behind America’s growing blogging community, by using data from the Pew Internet and American Life Project. The report concludes that 37% of bloggers say that their life and experience is their topic of choice, compared with only 11% who blog on politics or news.

Incidentally, yesterday we wrote about blogging for revenue and the ethical questions that arise from such practices. Results of Pew surveys show that only 7% of bloggers identified profit as a major motive for blogging compared with 52% who said that they blog primarily to “express themselves creatively” and 50% who blog to “share personal experiences with others”.