Online Media Cultist

Over the weekend, it was announced that social networking site for bloggers MyBlogLog will be rebranded (to something Yahoo-ized, perhaps?), redesigned, and rolled out with a new “widget 2.0″ component in the near future.

I actually think that MyBlogLog’s widget – which allows bloggers to see who is visiting their site, click their profile picture to learn more about them, interact with them, and so on – is far and away its best feature. Getting more detailed statistics or rich information about site visitors would be exciting, so I’m intrigued to find out what the “2.0″ will be all about.

As far as the MyBlogLog site itself, the fact that it’s very stripped down and simple at present is something of a double-edged sword: easy-to-use, but not much to do there at present.

Mike Arrington says that with the upcoming changes, infrastructure upgrades to ensure performance (i.e. not dragging down the page load time of a site where the widget is embedded, the surest way of getting people to drop you like a hot rock) must come first. The Social Web notes that spam is another significant challenge to MBL’s future.

While I’ve heard people complain about performance problems and spam (particularly the latter), I have not personally encountered trouble with either.

I’m excited to see what changes lay ahead for MyBlogLog. I was a relatively early adopter and cheerleader for the site turned somewhat concerned skeptic, so I look forward to seeing what wrinkles that this powerful networking and communications tool may offer.

One interesting prospect: maybe MyBlogLog will aspire to become a LinkedIn for bloggers? Picture advancing features for adding, organizing, and keeping in touch with blogging contacts.