There are several reasons why blogs are becoming successful tools in libraries:

• from the librarians’ point of view:
  

Similar to other libraries, the flagship blog of the EKU Library is News and Events. From the point of view of library staff, the blog technology is a winning option, versus others, because it allows the creation of multiple accounts, and thus the ability of multiple contributors to write content for the blog. The categorization feature allows very diverse information (announcements of events, discussion series, new resources, trials, etc.) to be posted and tagged according to different criteria. The blog is a community website, which can be updated easily and simultaneously by the most appropriate people. A more technical type of expertise is needed in setting up the blog, selecting the theme, creating user accounts, keeping up with the updates, but the content creation does not need to be constricted into one channel, the webmaster. From the experience of my institution, the collaborative nature of blogs and their ease of use were certainly what made the blog adoption successful among library staff.

• from the patrons’ point of view:

As libraries as institutions incorporated web 2.0 applications into their websites, patrons are also taking advantage of these tools. For example: the syndication feature that defines blogs. Users can subscribe to the RSS feed of the blog, thus keeping up-to-date with the latest news and events, with possible alerts regarding database service outages, or inclement weather closings. One qualitative sign of success of EKU’s News and Events blog are the comments received from the users. On the authors’ side, posts can be categorised and tagged; on the readers’ side, posts can be commented, and the comments are available to be viewed by other readers, who can also subscribe to them. Quantitatively, the usage of a blog can be measured with web statistics tools like Google Analytics, or blog plugins.

There are other factors that contribute to the popularity of blogs:

• the availability of themes makes blog design a fairly easy process: themes provide both aesthetics and functionality
• well-written web content, which is concise and informative
• integration with other web 2.0 tools: Fickr photostream, IM widget, blogroll, Delicious tag rolls and link rolls, etc.

Here are some examples of library blogs:

• Library of Congress Blog

• Drexel University Libraries Blog
  

• Georgia Tech Library News
  

• Johns Hopkins University Libraries Blog

• MIT Libraries News

• Northwestern University Library News

• Temple University Library News

• University of California at Berkeley Library News

• University of Nevada at Las Vegas Libraries News

• Vanderbilt University Library News

These are just several blogs that I would consider successful: long existence, based on their archive, professional design, interesting posts, customization and library branding.