Buzz volume spiked for this year’s Academy Awards on January 12th following the 2009 telecast of the Golden Globes and again on January 22nd as the nominations for the 81st Academy Awards were announced. Online discussions are starting to climb once again as the countdown to the big event is underway. What’s driving the chatter? This year’s best actor and best actress nominees and the highly anticipated red carpet attire.

Bloggers around the globe are chatting about Valentine’s Day as buzz shot up to almost 3% this week. But where’s the love? The graph below shows that love talk peaked around New Year’s Day but has been down ever since. According to BlogPulse, talk about love has dropped from 9% to only 5% of all posts.

Super Bowl buzz spiked over the weekend with 2.1% of blog buzz on game day, up 220% from Friday, January 31st. Online consumer discussion continues to increase today, up 12% from last night as bloggers react to the game, the performers and commercials.

Inaugural Buzz is in the air with nearly 2.75% of all blog posts centering around Barack Obama's historic inauguration. After an unprecedented election, Obama will be sworn in as the first African-American President in U.S. history.

Perhaps you didn’t notice recently, but WE DID! In early January, Nielsen Online’s BlogPulse search engine reached another landmark: 100 million (that’s million, with an M) blogs in our database. Simply put, BlogPulse has come a long way since its fairly inauspicious launch in the first week of May, 2004, when our newfound database of blogs amounted to fewer than a million.

But growth since then has been steady: 10 million blogs by April 2005, 12 million by June of 2005, and the blogs just keep on coming to the tune of several thousand or more a day. Any predictions on when we hit the 200-million mark? Anyone?

Contributor: Sue MacDonald

Blogosphere buzz around the Consumer Electronics Show is steadily increasing this week as consumers discuss the latest gadgets and gizmos being showcased, with more than 1.5 % of buzz volume on January 9th .

As we count down to the New Year, bloggers begin to discuss new years’ resolutions online, accounting for nearly .40% of chatter.

The holidays are upon us and consumers are scurrying to purchase last minute gifts from the web. Blog discussion on last minute shopping is up to .13% across all posts.

With the holiday season in full swing, video game systems have been generating lots of buzz. Microsoft's Xbox has kept its edge over the Wii and Playstation 3, accounting for .25% of all blog discussion over the last week.

Now that consumers have taken full advantage of Black Friday deals, the 2008 holiday shopping season has officially begun – and people are talking. Conversations around the holidays continued to rise the days leading up to Black Friday and through Cyber Monday, with more than 5% of discussion.

With Thanksgiving around the corner, consumers are gearing up for the holiday season. November 28th marks Black Friday, the day that many retailers feature doorbuster deals to attract shoppers to their stores. Consumers searching for the best gifts at the lowest prices are flocking to blogs for insight, accounting for .23% of online discussion.

Mobile devices can be addicting, even for President-elect Barack Obama. As the countdown to his inauguration as the nation’s 44th President is underway, Obama may have to surrender his BlackBerry. Bloggers began discussing this topic online with more than 0.04% of discussion, and it was among the top news stories on November 17th, according to rankings produced by www.blogpulse.com

As America honored its military veterans by way of parades, observances and celebrations, bloggers payed their respects online and reminded each other to thank those who have served our country. With 0.9% of discussion on blogs, the importance of Veteran’s day to consumers is evident.

In the wake of winning the 2008 U.S. presidential election, Senator Barack Obama was mentioned in nearly 20 percent of all blog discussions on Wednesday. In comparison, Senator John McCain was referenced by just 6.3 percent of all blog entries posted on November 5th.