Can of worms anyone? From Twitter:
DEFINITION: Bloggers – write about what they are passionate about. Journos – write about what other people are passionate about. (SilkCharm)
Heh.
Remind me again, what do journalists add to our filtering and discoverability process? I’m not talking about the type of journos who create original content by living undercover somewhere, risking life and limb to break stories. But stay at home types who interview a few people – compare them to bloggers who live above covers, risking life and limb to bring their true blogger stories.
Do you want “objectivity” – stories filtered, nay watered down, for public consumption? Or do you want “passion” – stories spoken from the heart complete with emotional tugs, tirades and misspellings? Is there a place for both?
You back again? o.O Oh well, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed, follow me on Twitter SilkCharm or get these blog posts in email when you want Good to see you again, feel free to leave a nice comment on a Featured Post :) !
I’d rather have passion and no misspelling
As I’ve ranted here
http://beatonl.wordpress.com/2008/04/14/do-bloggers-own-passion/
Reality all the way. Most content is mass market and not truly objective – and I’m a journalist. As a blogger you’ll find misspellings etc on my blog but I think it is more important to get the stories and ideas out there in a country where there is too little diversity in media.
It’s a false dichotomy.
Funny you should mention this, we were just discussing this at my blog/tumblr-circle:
http://ockerzeal.com/2008/04/15/mainstream-media-bloggers-are-total-noobs-and-thats-why-they-suck/
http://ockerzeal.com/2008/04/13/do-regular-bloggers-have-reverse-snobbery-towards-newspaper-bloggers/
As someone who is almost militantly anti-old media I can tell you now … bloggers (with standards and talent) all the way!
This is my big rant about why I love blogs and why the future of the media lies in its hands: http://ockerzeal.com/2008/04/04/who-can-you-trust/
Hmmm, not quite right IMO.
For a start the line just isn’t that clear – journos have always had opinion sections to vent their spleen – they just weren’t called “blogs”. Besides, plenty of journos are now bloggers too.
Next, good journos are passionate about their topic. Talk to a sports journo sometime
Next, most bloggers don’t risk a damn thing to post their stuff. The risk-life-and-limb blogs are few and far between.
Anyway, there’s a place for both. People still value “authority” and there’s still no real way to verify a blogger’s authenticity. How do you *really* know the blogger is hiding under rubble in a warzone? How do you know they’re not actually writing a fictional online account of a warzone, from the safety of their middle-class suburban home?
With journos you at least know they’re employed by people with a building. That you can ring. That you can sue. That was there last week. That will be there next week, more likely than the blogger. The publication has a track record you can consider when deciding how credible they are.
If you really really want a quick definition: Blogger – usually has no editor. Journo – usually has an editor. The rest is value judgements about having an editor
I don’t believe either one could replace the other. Neither one is better all the time. Neither one is more credible all the time. The true picture is somewhere between the two, most of the time.
@200ok hmmm let me look at some of these points
Commenters acting as Editors? Heh. The Sun comes in for a pasting – on Twitter its discussed as the worst traditional media article. I think the social network can act as editors… but I understand what you mean.
I think we need to be careful about the ‘journalists have editors’ argument. A general ‘journalists run filters on filters’ might be better? As in, journalists don’t create the content they simply distribute it. We want the original material, sans filtering, go to the interviewee (who may blog) who came up with the original thoughts.
And I definitely was distinguishing between the (few) journos that are with Four Corners or something and those who write trash for the Sunday papers.
At the end of the day, a journo can be a blogger, a blogger may go mainstream, either can sell out or find their passion, or have good days or bad days.
Perhaps it’s not the issue of training, or editorship, or even no/salary. It’s commitment and depth and passion on the sides of both. But without the burden of “having to work” the blogger may be freer in some ways?