The well moderated panel last night brought out a wide range of issues both about weblogs as they have evolved so far as the web’s most popular self-publishing format yet and about journalism on the cusp of a new interface between mass media and the reading and writing public.
Process update: I’ve made it through the transcript once. I’ll never get it letter perfect, but the exercise is reminding me of the flow of the various discussions and disagreements last night. The density and depth of what was said represents fairly heady stuff packed into a relatively short evening. It’s tempting to try to narrate the entire flow, but that I think would do a disservice to the speakers, so I will keep trying to extract a story from the event.
Hence the title of this entry, an emerging theme that weblogs are nothing new, but that they are chewing away at the margins between big one-to-many media and its formerly passive audience. Speaking of audiences, the listeners asked excellent questions that inspired additional rounds of discussion.
I’m looking forward also to seeing what other people are writing about all this. I guess I should ping blogpopuli with the quotations and the longer entries as they get them done. Plus cropping and sizing the photos, oh my!
Anyway, here is an extract of some of the big idears I think were broached at various points last night: In my notes I used all caps to distinguish my own thoughts from the gist of what was being said on the dais or sometimes just for emphasis because it was all happening so fast. I’ve pulled out the interjections that I’ll contribute when addressing the various ideas discussed in full, but I’ve kept the ones that commented on themes underlying various points in the discussion. As a reminder of the rawness, I am leaving the unpleasant capitalization as is:
BLOGGING ECOSYSTEM (METAFILTER BLOGDEX WIRED NEWS SALON NY TIMES TV GOOGLE DAYPOP)
early webloggers
FREEDOM OF THE PRESS FOR THOSE WHO OWN A PRESS
They don’t need permission.
{AN INTERACTIVE WRITING MEDIUM}
CREDIBILITY vs. POLISH
There’s always someone who knows more about something than you do.
AUTHENTICITY
Are webloggers journalists? Are phone users journalists?
HILER’S CORANTE ARTICLE ON THE ECOSYSTEM shows where blogging fits in with journalism today.
ARE J’S NERVOUS WHEN SO MANY DO FOR FREE SOMETHING SIMILAR TO WHAT THEY EXPECT TO BE PAID TO DO??
MONOPOLY != CREDIBILITY
SINGLE-SOURCE EXPERTS compared to GENERALISTS
you don’t need the resources of the new york times
(but how does the reader judge??)
A CONTINUUM – subcommunity – microcommunity –
SPHERES OF DISCOURSE
they checked county COURTHOUSES
journalists on the WELL vs. the CYBERPORN cover story
YOU DONT HAVE TO BE PAID TO DO LEGITIMATE THINGS
Web AND WEBLOGS ARE COMPETITION FOR READERS
My question: BLOG NEURAL NET??
TOOLS IN THIER INFANCY
RSS – semantic web (xml, etc.)
READERS who are also WRITERS
??TRADITIONAL MEDIA THREATENED BY THIS??
NETWORK REPUTATION CREDIBILITY WRITERS HOBBYISTS
-KNITTING – MUSTANG CONVERTIBLES FROM 1965
scot: economy of ego (ATTENTION)
SET MODERATION THRESHOLD HIGH
(LESSIG via SCOT: THE SOFTWARE IS POLITICAL)
TRANSPARENCY OPENNESS
“SO J STILL HAVE GATEKEEPER ROLE??”