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Blog*Spot ArchivesContactRichard Ceccarelli Josh Mandir |
Friday, December 24, 2004I have a free pass?Just found the time to sit down and read the new Time (the Person of the Year issue), with this fine article (paid subscription required) by Lev Grossman about the guys from Powerline. All in all, it's a very accurate and informative piece, with many excellent insights about the blogosphere. But this passage bothered me:
And if bloggers do become big business, they will lose their free pass and become subject to the same scrutiny that 60 Minutes is under. After all, it's not as if Power Line never makes a mistake. It's just that right now, because Scott Johnson isn't as famous as Dan Rather, the expectations and the stakes aren't very high.The notion that blogs are an unregulated and dangerous form of media is absolutely false. The blogosphere regulates and fact-checks itself with astonishing effectiveness. It has it's own system of checks and balances - more so than the main stream media, that's for sure. For all the publicity blogs received during Rathergate - and the reputation it has earned as the foremost media watchdog - it's been my experience that bloggers are far more likely to turn their wrath on fellow bloggers rather than big media. Why, just today a fellow blogger (who resides at Firebrand of the American League) took exception to one of my posts. He made himself, and his version of the facts, heard. A response was made, and from there it's up to the reader to sort it out - all very democratic-like. If he wanted to take the exercise further, he could make an opposing post over at his blog (as has often happened in the past). Bloggers make mistakes, but generally those mistakes are pounced-on and corrected in short order, no matter how small and inconsequential. And that's just what happens in this small, dark corner of the blogosphere - the standards are much higher for high-profile blogs such as Powerline. When was the last time you saw a cross-network debate of the facts in the MSM? Never, that's when. Judging from the in-house fact-checking practices at places like 60 Minutes, I'd say it should start happening routinely. |
