July 6, 2005

Chattanooga Paper Explores Blogs

The Chattanooga Times Free Press story on blogs ran on Independence Day, which means almost nobody saw it. And because the Times Free Press locks its online content behind a register-and-pay wall, almost nobody online saw the story, either.

But the story - by reporters Michael Davis and Herman Wang, is a pretty solid story that deserves to be seen, read, and commented on. I was interviewed by Davis and extensively quoted so I've taken the liberty of including the story in the extended portion of this article, interspersed with a few additional comments of my own.

Bloggers heat up Internet By Michael Davis and Herman Wang Staff Writers

Online journals known as blogs are the hot tool of the rapidly evolving Internet, allowing Web users to write and reply to news and commentary. Many Web logs, or blogs, are largely political in nature and encompass the full ideological spectrum, from left to right.

Tennessee politicians like Gov. Phil Bredesen; state Sen. Roy Herron, D-Dresden ; and state Rep. Stacey Campfield, R-Knoxville, are creating personal blogs that allow them to comment on their government activities.

Josiah Roe, founder of local blogging site www.chattablogs.com, said more politicians ought to embrace the format and praised Rep. Campfield for his frankness. "I don’t agree with some of what he says, but he’s being honest," Mr. Roe said. "I feel like I know Stacey Campbell. If politicians take the time to speak to their constituents, you can’t beat that."

Blog advocates say the medium opens communication by allowing inexpensive, instantaneous publishing, while critics of the Web journals say blogs blur news and opinion and contribute to an already polarized political climate.

Lee Rainie, director of the nonpartisan Pew Internet & American Life Project, said blogs are largely positive for American society. "It gives voice to extremists in some cases," he said. "Overall the net benefit of the Internet and blogs is that more people are engaging in political discussion. ... I think as a culture we’re better off for that."

Mr. Rainie said the blogosphere, as the interlinking community of bloggers commonly is known, exploded in popularity during and following the 2004 presidential election, as the mainstream media highlighted the online strength of former Vermont governor

Now, more than 32 million American adults read blogs, while more than 11 million American adults have created personal online journals, according to the Pew Internet & American Life Project. The medium is favored by younger Web users: 19 percent of online Americans ages 18 to 29 have created blogs, opposed to 5 percent of those 50 and older.

Mary Coffman, a professor of journalism at Northwestern University, said political blogging quickly is gaining mainstream acceptance. "People at first thought it was just a quirky thing, but now we’re seeing more and more politicians, interest groups and citizens groups involved in blogging," Ms. Coffman said. "A real testament to blogging and its power is that even CNN now has a regular segment on their 'Inside Politics' program looking at the hottest political blogs of the day."

Bill Hobbs ... has been publishing his Tennessee politics blog since November 2001. He averages 1,000 unique visitors a day and has had 1.5 million visitors to the site since its inception, he said.

Mr. Hobbs, a former newspaper reporter, describes his postings as "journalism with some point of view added to it," and says political blogs attract activists who want detailed analysis of policy and government action.

"It’s not like a daily paper where somebody might buy it just for the sports scores or the coupons on Wednesday," he said. "They don’t attract a huge audience, but the audience they attract is very into the subject they cover."

With such passionate postings, bloggers are often divisive, said Carol Darr, director of George Washington University’s Institute for Politics, Democracy & the Internet. "They don’t cause the partisanship that’s out there, but they will greatly exacerbate it," she said.

Ms. Coffman said questions remain about blogger news-gathering techniques and the role these Web activists play in reporting news. "People are trying to figure it out," Ms. Coffman said. "It raises all sorts of issues. People get confused about who's a reporter and who’s not, and are journalistic mores being followed by bloggers. Often they’re not. It blurs the line between traditional media and new media."

Closer to home, Tennessee's growing number of political blogs are playing a growing role in political journalism. This year alone, political blogs have broken two significant stories from the legislature, as I discussed here the other day, while blogger Sharon Cobb is exposing the Bredesen administration's real agenda and tactics on TennCare reform, and two liberal blogs - Cobb's and Tennessee Guerrilla Women - have provided by far the best coverage of the ongoing TennCare protest sit-in at the governor's office. Here , Blake Wylie has done great work on several stories, including the issue of police surveillance cameras in public places. And we're just getting started.

Mr. Hobbs said he started www.volpols.com so that state legislators can start their own free blogs and further civic discourse. "It’s just getting started," he said. "I think the interaction between the blogging legislator and the public is going to be a powerful thing in the future."

But with their interactive format, blogs breed accountability, Mr. Hobbs said. If he makes a mistake, readers post clarifications on his blog, he said. "If I have readers and I get something wrong, readers will know it," he said. "It’s self-factchecking."

Local blogger John Bailes said blogging can serve as a complement to newspapers, television stations and other media outlets. "As far as replacing the reporter, I can’t imagine that, unless someone’s going to pay a blogger," he said. "None of us have the establishment that (reporters) are part of, the experience, the connections. We don’t have everything at our disposal, but we can get something out quickly and get people talking."

BillHobbs.com is journalism. Sometimes it's journalism in the way an newspaper news article is journalism - reporting facts. Sometimes it's journalism the way the editorial page is journalism - providing fact-based analysis and commentary. It's still journalism - just delivered via pixels on a browswer screen instead of ink smeared on super-thin slices of dead trees.

That's why, although I used the words "blogs" and "bloggers" in this article, I don't actually like the words much any more because they are so broadly defined as to be meaningless for the purpose of discussion of news media and politics. Just as not all photographers are news photographers, not all "bloggers" are news bloggers.

A "blogger" is just a writer with a website. Not all bloggers write about politics or the media or news, or do so exclusively - some write about their hobbies, their kids, or their cats. Some occasionally post photos of old barns.

So, in the end, the question is this: Is it good to have more people reading, writing about and commenting politics and the news of the day? As I told the Times Free Press' Davis, though it didn't make it into the story, if you think more information and more discussion is good for democracy, then you have to like blogs.