Reader Professor Jay Rosen, Head of the NYU Dept. of Journalism and editor of Pressthink, sends in a good tip for freelancers searching for ways to come up with hot topics:

"What a lot of people do now is follow the sites that tell you about the hottest blog posts. If something appears on all three or stays on the list for days and days, it is a good proxy for reader interest." He lists Daypop, Blogdex and Technorati as being good bets.

If you still are unclear on what a blog is, you might be wondering what you're currently looking at. It is a blog.