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Blogging for Dummies?
Posted by
michael
on Thu Jun 06, 2002 08:57 PM
from the flame-retardant-suit-necessary dept.
from the flame-retardant-suit-necessary dept.
Guinnessy writes "Wired News reports that one of the most respected journalism schools in America is going to be teaching blogging as part of next semester's course. I find this quite interesting, especially considering the existing controversy over whether blogging, such as Slashdot, is real journalism or not. I still haven't made up my mind." "Blog" now takes the cake as the most ill-used word of 2002. Please draw distinctions between webpages with news, mindless link propagation, discussion sites, personal diaries or journals, etc.
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Slashdot a blog? (Score:1)
Journalism (Score:3, Insightful)
Slashdot a Blog? (Score:4, Insightful)
Journalism yes (Score:1)
Re:Journalism yes (Score:5, Insightful)
Not REAL journalism (Score:3, Funny)
http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=02/05/15
This may be a great thing. It somewhat officially broadens what an important institution considers journalism.
"Blogging" (Score:1)
Re:"Blogging" (Score:4, Funny)
How is [a weblog] different from an online journal?
Weblogs do not contain little graphics at the end of each entry telling you that the author is "feeling bummed."
Blogging for Dummies (Score:1)
Blogs and Cat People (Score:3, Interesting)
Where are the dog people?
hrmmm.... (Score:1)
Don't forget wiki (Score:1, Insightful)
Blogs are lame.... (Score:1)
Why Slashdot in my eyes is not a blog (Score:1)
Learning from slashdot... (Score:4, Funny)
Matt Drudge and online journalism (Score:5, Interesting)
Lately, however, such scrutiny has become non-existent. Whether this is a result of the 9/11 attack and its subsequent Arab bashing or because powerful entities with ties to liberal political movements (Ted Turner) have bought out all the major news outlets is up in the air. If anything, it's probably a combination of both factors. These days we see nothing but carefully crafted 'news' and air-brushed reporters and anchors on the tube. The real news gets lost somewhere on the cutting room floor.
So where can we get our news now without the Big Brother Filter working overtime? The main source is the Web. Sites like the Drudge Report, NewsMax, and IndyMedia (not to mention our own new-anarchist Slashdot
So what comes out of this new media? Frankly, crap for the most part. However, hidden deep in the headlines are jewels of information and true news. Unfortunately these gems are surrounded by conspiracy theories and crackpot reporting that it is difficult to separate the wheat from the chaff. That's the problem with the new media.
The benefit of the new media (or blogs as the article incorrectly calls it) is that discussion of the topics at hand can begin almost immediately. Slashdot.org is a great example because after each story the readers can chime in with their own comments and insights or provocations. In short, it is news by consensus. Not too shabby.
Meaning of blog is fine, dammit (Score:4, Interesting)
No. I won't. And you're somewhat screwed up to think a word's popular use, lending itself to a definition, should change simply because it's too broad. A word, part of language, can encompass many topics and things. That's why we use them.
The single word, blog, can mean all of those types of pages. If you want better distinctions, find another word, came up with another word and hope it becomes part of popular language (you've contributed before with a term, e.g. the slashdot effect), or use language (words, usage, formatting) to clarify the distinctions you seek.
A square is (or you're case, wait, that's too broad) a rectangle, but a rectangle is not a square. Caucasion, human. Web pages, or slashdot.org.
Re:Meaning of blog is fine, dammit (Score:4, Insightful)
This is a bit of a sore point for me, because the dictionary makers in my native language, French, constantly try to impose ridiculous rules on the language. For instance, "chat" has taken hold as the French word for Internet chatting. But the Academie Francaise, in its infinite wisdm, declared the artificial word "clavardage" (a hideous mutant splice of the French words for "keyboard" and "small talk") to be the Pure French Word to replace it. The worst part is that some people have begun to use it. We shouldn't ascribe that kind of power to the so-called "authorities".
I don't know which is funnier... (Score:5, Funny)
'blog (Score:4, Insightful)
My first reaction is: "Great, just when I thought the trend of whining bohemian teenagers was on the decline, more fascinating online drivel about how the Offspring sold out". Rethinking it, though, maybe the internet will take more shape as a source of alternative media. Televised news is a joke, newspapers almost all suck (besides the Indypendant or the National Review, I can't think of any worth a read), the clearchannel or the radio, whatever it's called, is getting more silly by the day...maybe a large group of "bloggers" seeking out stories and drawing the lines between them will form a perfect source.
I mean, the WTO protests in Seattle a few years ago had TV/radio/Newspapers reporting protestors rioting, and cops using almost no force against them. Personal accounts contradicted this and soon after, video and photos turn up on the internet of cops firing rubber bullets into crowds of people sitting on the sidewalk, tear gas canisters flying and even one cop ripping someone's gas mask off to pepper-spray(?) him. Who would know, if not for the fact that individuals spread the word independantly, that quite a few innocent people had been lumped in with the couple of assholes that kept showing up on CNN?
You can't take an individual's opinion as fact, but the same could be said of major news outlets. Similarly, you can't expect those major news stations to fess up when some stories don't add up, or are mysteriously omitted. If enough people start reporting what they see, eventually we'll get a much larger idea of what is really going on around here.
Re:'blog (Score:4, Informative)
Not all what people are calling blogs are just journal and online gossip columns - there are quite a few out there that have a lot of good information and intelligent, timely conversation. I don't usually go a day without checking Metafilter [metafilter.com], Kuro5hin [kuro5hin.org], and not least Slashdot (you know where [slashdot.org]!)
These sites announce and discuss news, happenings and issues on average much sooner and with much more intelligence than more common news and media outlets - showing a wide variety of opinions and viewpoints on everything. It's easy to spot important comments, ideas, and trends when you've got the benefit of community discussion to fill out the picture. Some of these sites use voting and moderation to help elevate messages that need to be seen to the users' eye, allowing them to easily find the highlights of any discussion or issue.
There are even specialty "blogs" that offer information on more specific areas of interest. The state of the art in blogging and scripting in general is being developed and discussed right in front of your eyes at Dave Winer's Scripting News [scripting.com]. Scripting News focuses on scripting languages (python primarily) and blogging using the Radio Userland [userland.com] system, a rich weblogging environment that allows the interface and performace of sites to be scripted and adjusted as much as you like. It can utilize live news feeds from other systems and sources, as well. The New York Times recently agreed to distribute NYTimes.com content to sites using Radio. Winer's site highlights the technological aspects of running blogs and gives a lot of good information and tools for creating incredible sites using technologies like XML-RPC, SOAP, python, and others. The links to other sites for their comments and viewpoints also provide a good view of issues and the community in general.
Celebrities are even doing it: Adam Curry [curry.com] of MTV and broadcast fame does with great results and Wil Wheaton [wilwheaton.net] runs a pretty good site using another blogging system called Movable Type [slashdot.org]. There are some pretty professional sites springing up using the tools available.
The timeliness of sites like Slashdot and Metafilter keep participants up to date and informed on relevant issues. We all know that to be true.
The types of functionality available to the blogging community cover a wide span of needs and purposes. If all you want is a journal that a couple of people can read - you can have that. If you want to have a place to store all of your bookmarks and discuss and share them with others - you can have that, too. If you want something that will integrate all of your news and discussion - you can have it. If you want to compete with Big Media, you're fully free and capable of doing just that, as well.
With such a wide choice of blogging themes, it's easy to see that there is room for much diversity with this technology. All roses may be flowers, but so are dandelions - Ferarris may be cars, but what I'm driving's definitely just a car! "Blog", while a catchy name, is still a broad category. It's like saying "web page" - it could mean anything. Once "blogging" is mainstream, it will be time to make some new categories and descriptions.
Blogosphere (Score:5, Interesting)
There was also another story making the rounds about a week ago about making a living from blogging. I was expecting a lot more from it, i.e., some real details on "how to do it", but it was still a reasonable article. It might give you some ideas. Mileage may vary.
Last link whore comments: If you haven't seen Blogdex [mit.edu] or Daypop [daypop.com], you might want to check them out. Very nice tools to see what it hot in the world of weblogs.
hmmm (Score:5, Insightful)
I dont know about you... but I dont have much respect for journalists - nor berkeley...
I find that journalists have about as much integrity as lawyers and politicians. I guess thats why those groups run the world... little cunning bastards that do anything for a buck.
"Blogs" are not journalism (Score:5, Insightful)
Merely linking to news does not equal journalism. Slashdot isn't journalism. Kuro5hin [kuro5hin.org] isn't journalism. Yahoo's Full Coverage [yahoo.com] site isn't journalism. Hell, Fark [fark.com] isn't journalism. They are link farms. They find and post links to actual news stories across the world. While this makes for an easy-to-read digest of news and information, it does not mean the site becomes a seeming bastion of original journalism.
Real journalism, IMHO (speaking as one), is going out, researching a story, interviewing people, and putting together a concise unbiased story (keep your media bias arguments until the end of class kids). Journalism is not posting a link to a news story elsewhere, and then adding your own personal opinions or thoughts. While the Berkeley school is trying to avoid this, putting a "blog" label on it won't make any difference. Major news sites, like the New York Times [nytimes.com] and the Washington Post [washingtonpost.com] already post their news to the Internet in real time. Some even include "Comment on this story" links as well.
Take away the personal opinions and rambling links, and you don't have a so-called "blog." You have an online news site, just like the big boys. Calling it a "blog" doesn't give any more "hipness" or credibility.
I wish everyone would get over this stupid "BLOGS ARE THE FUTURE OF JOURNALISM" crap. You know what? They aren't.
Not everything is a front-page story (Score:5, Insightful)
It doesn't take an in-depth analysis of the news story to make journalism. It only needs to be true, correct, and competently addressed even if it's little more than a footnote.
Not everything in a newspaper is a front-page story, you know? News companies have limited space and resources to create and publish those marvellously researched pieces you're so fond of. There are also columns, socials, and those collections of AP/REUTERS notes that you find almost as a margin to the "big news" and compose 90% of what's happening in the world.
"Online news sites" are similar to these last. They condense information as much as possible while trying to give a non-misleading picture of what it is about (and usually fail), so that interested readers can do their own research and find out more.
Blogs with active comment systems are a mix of these with "open-eds" and "letters to the editor".
But Blogs may also be more than just a collection of links. While Slashdot follows this pattern, it's mostly because that's what it does best and/or what the community values (witness the popularity, on the other hand, of Jon Katz).
Kuro5hin, for example, follows more closely the pattern of a magazine or publication. MLPs are similar to the link collections (or AP notes), while the rest of the site is often populated by articles where the links are secondary to the argumentative content... which is in some cases not entirely about the current emotional state of the poster. Original content that is not a substitute for group therapy is possible in a blog, after all.
The advantage of blogs is that they provide an immediate source for the reader to do their research, so they don't necessarily have to accept the incomplete, inevitably misleading piece of news they were given. Users can interact with each other and with the author exchanging sources of research, and even correcting intentional and unintentional errors in the article.
The disadvantage is that, being posted by amateurs, they degenerate into diaries with links... that is, a throughly unentertaining and unresearched "opininion column" on electronic media.
Communities formed around these throughly biased weblogs (witness Slashdot), and will react against the removal of that bias because it gives them "a sense of community". They enjoy the non-journalistic flavor of the blog, but that does not mean a journalistic endeavor cannot benefit from the blog format. Rather, it means it must resist the temptation of pandering to the public which is probably greater than in other formats because of the greater level of feedback.
A journalistic "blog" should not foster that bias and would probably be unable to provide any "sense of community" while being competent in the journalistic sense, but one or many biased communities could be "resident" in a journalistic blog, though, much in the same way Clans or Guilds are specific to some online games.
I agree with you, though. Blogs are not the future of journalism, nor should they be. Hyperlinks are the future of journalism and should be the present; Blogs are just one of the ways of getting that into the heads of stubborn journalists half a century too late.
Is it marketing or journalism? (Score:4, Informative)
It can be tough to decide how to define something. A blog is a blog is a blog. The material posted by kids about their lives might mean nothing to you but everything to that kid and his/her peers. If you don't like it, move along. Call it a journal or call it something else. Call it a blog, or not. Fine.
On the other hand, there are some "industrial strength" blogs out there. At a minimum, this is going mainstream, for better or worse. For example, there are blogs written by folks that are employed by Macromedia. Examples...
Mike Chambers (Flash MX):
http://radio.weblogs.com/0106797/ [weblogs.com]
Vernon Viehe (ColdFusion MX):
http://vvmx.blogspot.com/ [blogspot.com]
Matt Brown (Dreamweaver MX):
http://radio.weblogs.com/0106884/ [weblogs.com]
And then there a blogs by the professional folks at MSNBC [msnbc.com]:
Eric Alterman: Altercation
Michael Moran: World Agenda
Cosmic Log: Alan Boyle's Diary
Chris Matthews: Hardball
Jan Herman: The Juice
All distinctions are false (+0, Zen) (Score:2)
After all, a journalist who writes a story is just commiting their own observations to print. Is this so very different from linking to what someone else wrote? By placing the links in a certain order, by carrying certain stories (but never the ones I submit
Personal experiences in a personal journal are news to somebody. After all, NY Times Editorials are definitely news. I don't see a hard distinction here.
Discussion sites may not reflect public opinion in a "scientific" fashion, but they do reflect public opinion, and public opinion is news. Anecdotes, often shared on such sites, are also news. They can also propogate links and contain excerpts from people's personal ruminations (like what you are reading right now.)
Since all of these things are news, they are all webpages with news. Having temporarily accepted Michael's sub-division, I now reject it, and from hereon out I will just say blogs.
They'll also debate whether blogs are "a sensible medium for doing journalism, and what does that mean?"
Feh! What horseshit. Who cares? I think people should spend less time debating what things mean, and more time being ironic. If you can wildly contradict yourself in a single sentence, that is best, but cognitive dissonance can only be a good thing, however long your text may run.
If it isn't a legitimate medium for doing journalism, we need to find a way to legitimise it, because people are going, increasingly, to be getting their information from blogs. Unless you want to take the stance that what people read and think is not legitimate (common in academia) you've got no choice.
Blogging is journalism, but not always acceptable (Score:3, Insightful)
That a journalist's work has to first pass through the scrutiny of his peers and his editors is a key factor in assuring the quality of published information. Blogging might be journalism, but it's Rambo-style -- one man for himself, whatever he writes, gets published. When you're talking about something like the BBC, CNN, or the Wall Street Journal, letting reporters publish on-the-fly might give individuals too much control over what sort of information makes it to the public.
Now with the Internet growing as a major distribution point for news, perhaps the future will bring us a merger of 'traditional' journalism and web logs: real-time news that, while still going through the standard editing channels, is published as soon as it's put in. The idea of releasing news each day may fade away from the Internet entirely, leaving us with news sources that publish news as soon as it happens. It'd be one more (small) step towards a truly networked form of human civilization.
Slashdot is a Discussion Site (Score:2)
My 2cents.
Boggles My Mind (Score:2, Insightful)
Blogs (and /.) are most definitely journalism! (Score:3, Informative)
My hunch, in fact, is that considering the various reviews, interviews, and articles, Slashdot's percentage of original content compares favorably with lots of so-called mass media outlets. In fact, it's got a big leg up on mass media insofar as one often finds the people mentioned in the stories, or people with a personal connection to the story, posting comments, giving readers a different perspective on the article. I'm not prone to hyperbole, so I won't call slashdot "visionary" or "groundbreaking" but I do call it "really cool" and, most definitely, "journalism".
Blogs, too, are journalism. Personal diaries may be the most trivial form of journalism, but it is, at least, reporting. It may not be up to the standards of Columbia, or conformant to the AP style guide, but I've read a lot of crap in "real" news outlets and a lot of informative, if non-traditional, reporting on blog sites. In any case, I'm leery of refusing to call blogs journalism, as it plays into the hands of those who would separate "journalists" from the rest of the public and confer upon them rights that are (IMO) properly invested in us all - particularly freedoms of speech and of the press.
Consider the case of Paul Trummel [seattleweekly.com] who has been jailed for refusing to take down articles on his website, on the grounds that he is "not really a journalist." Understand why I'm not so keen on drawing a line between "journalist" and blogger?
-Isaac
"Journalism" isn't all that easy to define, either (Score:3, Interesting)
After all, is it a set of standards and proceedures for reporting information, or is it just the actual presenting of information that one discovered/uncovered/learned/etc.?
An editoral or opinion piece in many major newspapers are good examples, as some of them have the writers actually out covering some sort of story, whether it be government corruption or international tensions or what have you, but the only difference between the editorals and the articles is that the editorals have the author stating their own personal feelings about it, rather than "Just the Facts, Ma'am." Their opinionated pieces are basically the same as something the a guy posts on his website regarding something important to him.
Similarly, let's say I'm wondering about a topic, so I go out and ask around with some people connected to it, check what records I can find, do fact-checking, and then post my findings on my personal website, would that be journalism? I'm not a professional, and it's posted on a site that's not claiming to be a source of hard news, but all the same, if I followed the same proceedures that any other reporter does, what's the difference if it was read in a newspaper or on the web?
Very few people believe all the read on the 'Net, for good reason. Similarly, very few people believe all they see on TV, as well, also for good reason.
The whole concept of what "blogging" really is seems to a rather pointless debate. News can be reported in any format by any person, really -- the means doesn't make the difference. Teaching blog at a school just seems to me more or less showing students one way that a web site can be run, and not an exercise in some new "cutting-edge" journalism technique.
Matt
Slashdot real journalism?Well, if you have to ask! (Score:1)
Well, if you have to ask then you're still not sure of what your definition of "reall journalism" is yet!
Really though, I think /. technically qualifies as real journalism because not all of the stories are from other sites and sources right?
You're right, I have no clue either.
I read Blogging for Dummies (Score:1)
Slashdot & Journalism (Score:1, Informative)
What interests me the most is point 3, because most of the time here, people with give their views and opinions of posts. Therefore
definition of "blog" (Score:1)
If you're lookin for a top-notch diary site, please allow me to recommend "Digital Expressions" - http://www.digitalexpressions.nu
This is what I wish I'd said about blogging. (Score:1)
In other news, a blogging site runs a story about (Score:1)
Irrelevant supposition (Score:2, Interesting)
That's an odd reminder to make; surely it's a settled matter for this audience. Consider whether you'd ask a Catholic monk if he thought Catholicism was "real religion." Of course, it isn't as weighty a domain, but in both cases it's about the concept being defined by the usage, rather opposed to the presupposition required of your point.
Slashdot is no less authoritative than CNN and no more than a journalist's daily diary entires, if you let go the notion of a pure objective journalism. Each fulfills a need and an expectation that in the whole provides us with "journalism." Besides, isn't the "blog: is it or isn't it" debate only being conducted through the proxies of media conglomerates? Is a conservative professor going to change my mind about covering any topic I choose and taking advantage of available technology for delivery?
Instead of providing a field for the self-preservation instincts of a AOL-TW, let's embrace the newly discovered (but always extant) complexities of journalism as a given.
Berkeley blogs (Score:1)
It seems only natural for Berkeley to host a class on the topic.
All Your Base Is Blog To Us (Score:3, Funny)
We're gonna need a new buzzword pretty soon that means "painfully lame yet expertly produced synthetic blog". I can't think of one at the moment, but then I don't even know what "leet" means.
Hey chicks and dudes, let's rap!
it's not about blogging, but freelancing (Score:2, Interesting)
There is a decreasing number of jobs available full time on newspapers and in television as more media companies merge and cut staff, especially in rural areas.
Hence, a need for journalists to become their own employer, and to create freelance opportunities.
Journalists are also traditionally slow to adopt new technology, and have been particularly apprehensive about the Internet. The blogging class serves two purposes, to give them ideas, and also to show them ways to evaluate Internet information and use new technology.
Blog. See journal. (Score:1, Insightful)
Most are run by little whiny anti-social hosers who just sit and complain about how bad their life is and how humanity sucks.
You don't have to be a Kreskin, but more than likely, no one gives a flying fsck about your cat or what you did today. (See also: Pointless waste of valuable bandwidth.)
Interesting Title (Score:2)
Do you mean to say that it isn't already?
Distinction (Score:2)
Hey, isn't Slashdot all of that and more?
Confusing 'Journal' with 'Journalism'? (Score:4, Insightful)
'Journal'. From the latin 'Diurnalis', meaning daily. A record kept daily, like a diary, which probably evolves from the same root - latin 'dies', meaning 'day'.
'Journalism': The collecting, writing, editing, and presenting of news or news articles in newspapers and magazines and in radio and television broadcasts.
It seems that somehow people putting their journals on the web via a web-log got all up themselves and decided they were 'journalists'. Errr no. Writing a journal does not make you a journalist these days.
The UCB course mentioned in the article looks more like it will teach on-line journalism, but they've buzzworded it with 'blogging' as a PR exercise. These guys know PR, you see.
Baz
I should remind Some People (Score:1)
Imagine you are a Newspaper PUblisher..
Where do your Journalists come from?
Ah they came from the first entry level job at a enwspaper publishjer..the paper boyor gopher!
THey got rpomoted becasue they could write to the common man and women..
It is interesting that weblogs and blogs are getting promoted by the internet audience becasue they can write to the common mana, women, and child whereas readership in mainline Press has dwindled..
If I was a Online Journalist paid by TimeWarner, NewsRider, or etc I would be worried about my job..right about now..why? Becasue in a modern society there are4 a lot more people who can write that the small group of journalists..
As the case may be..its part of our jobs so we have to write in an easily understandable way..
Not Journalism (Score:2, Informative)
It isn't a blog, but Slashdot appears to be a direct descendant of BBS systems, with a mix of readers and staff posting material from other sources to a web site that facilitates reader comments. I see little evidence of anything approaching journalism here. Most real blogs that I read are more akin to newspaper columns, rather than straight journalism. Again, there's little evidence of real editorial review, but it is interesting that the blogging community has the potential to enforce some degree of fact-checking
To Slash or to Journal? (Score:2, Insightful)
It's a great Idea (Score:1)
Please draw distinctions (Score:1)
So, which category does Slashdot fall into?
Which category? (Score:1)
Re:Gah! (Score:1)
Re:blog (Score:1)
Re:Blogging, Markov Style (Score:1)
Re:blog (Score:1)
I think the real problem, though, is how can you be taught to write a weblog? The whole point is that they are pretty much as unstructured as you like. When you start adding rules and trying to make every one look the same, then they will just be crap journalism. Until then, some actually are interesting glimpses into the lives of real people.