It seems the rage right now in media to be talking about what the "blog revolution" really means. Fine, fine, I'll bite. (Beware potential navel-gazing)
It is important I think at this point to separate personal blogs from news blogs, as they are really different animals in their goals. Your present author finds himself in a somewhat middle ground (genetically engineered half-dragon half-rabbit?) between those animals, and several other blogs do as well. But on the whole I'd say I fall into news blog category, which is to say a blog that focuses on current (or older, forgotten) events knowingly filtered through the author's experience, opinions and biases.
Ultimately, my goal for this thing was create a regular outlet for me to write. I do hold some desire to write "for a living", and it seemed that the blog is a perfect experience to get used to writing pieces on a regular basis. I can tackle any topic, I can be in charge of my own publishing and deadlines and they can be as polished as I want them to be. And I think it has helped me to become more structured and regular in my writing. True enough, I miss many days of posting due to the vagaries of daily working life or just laziness, but I have created a pretty sizable document of text here, and it has helped me to solidify my own ideas.
I'm not certain how interesting it all is to anybody, but really, that's not my primary goal, so truthfully, I don't care. I publish all this for a few reasons:
1) Publishing is a impetus to write. By putting these articles out in the open, I create a deadline or a drive for myself that would not be the same if they were just filling up my hard drive.
2) Publishing creates a dialogue around ideas and more importantly around my writing that filling up my hard drive does not. By allowing people to comment I get criticism of the things I'm saying, which helps me to understand and define my position. And by seeing that many people are not understanding a point I was trying to make, it is clear to me that my writing was not concise enough. Sunlight is the best disinfectant.
3) It is possible that some of my ideas or articles could be interesting or intriguing or informative. I'm thrilled if they are. But that is mostly an ego-stroke whereas the blog is meant as a training exercise.
I will ocassionally use it to inform people about events in my life (or fictional events in my life) and I'm glad for its ability to do that. But the main goal is the above.
Most of the talk right now is on news blogging, and its relevance or usefullness or irresponsibility. A lot of the talk has been focused on how the blog is not mainstream journalism, which is a bit like writing an essay on why a hamburger is not an omelette. It is certainly true that most bloggers do not have the research available that the mainstream outlets do, and often their reporting is more ideologically driven. But really, that's the point. The news blogs serve as an outpouring of "public comment" in a way that opinion polls or focus groups never really could. They exist primarily to comment on jounalism, not to replace it. But they also form a new form of journalism, which is part editorial, part media-critic and part consumer advocate. The major news outlets are safe, and Wonkette or Instapundit or Andrew Sullivan will not replace the New York Times. But these blogs do represent a change in the way journalism is practiced.
Chomsky writes about manufacturing consent, as a more subtle form of propaganda, in which the powers that be make use of the media to create belief in the public. It's hard to find a more perfect example of this theory in action than the run-up to "Operation: Iraqi Freedom". I do wonder honestly if decades from now the historians will say that Democracy was a valid form of government before the invention of mass communication, which was ultimately its demise. I suspect there is something new on the horizon.
But right now, the best defense against the manufacture of consent is in an active and diverse blogosphere. Recent examples like Rather's forged memos or the Eason Jordan story are just a small part of what a healthy incredulity can bring about, and are only the beginning of the great strides blogs will bring to responsible journalism.
One criticism I see over and over is that blogs are not original. That they merely comment on existing stories and add personal bias. But this reveals the critic as criminally behind the times. We live in a cross-referenced world. The greatest invention for information storage, retrieval, and comprehension is the Internet, and it is really little more than connecting things that already exist. Google doesn't *add* anything, they merely help you find things better. Hypertext is the 21st century version of text, and soon everything will be linked. Just because blogs only serve as commentary doesn't make them unnecessary. In the future, the commentary *is* the story.
Notes:
A few words about the personal blog in practice-- While I have in the past been critical of much of personal blogging, I consider its use to be somewhat revolutionary as well. In this modern era of mass communication, even personal life can become a media outlet. And there's something pretty fantastic about being able to tell the whole world you got a new job, or an A on your statistics test, or herpes (although I haven't actually seen that on a blog yet). There is probably more to come on that front as well, although I think I used up my prophecy tokens for the day.
And just a quick note on Eason Jordan: Why do you have to be right-wing to be disgusted by someone (especially a high-level executive at a news network) making comments that the US military deliberately targets journalists? I'm all for the free exchange of ideas, but if you're going to say something so inflammatory and dangerous, you'd better have *something* to back it up.
Posted by ktismael at February 25, 2005 12:58 PM