Weblogsky: East Coast media try to find blogging's pulse.

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East Coast media try to find blogging's pulse.

Short on time, so this is a quick one... but I just got these links to posts about a meeting of bloggers with mainstream media (via Jay Rosen). The links are to Jay's comments, David Weinberger's, Jeff Jarvis', and something from the Business Week blog. So this meeting was mainstream media talking to mainstream media people who've become bloggers, and it was all folks from the east coast. Looks like an interesting discussion, but I can't help but note the ivory tower aspect. I think MSM and, to some extent, east coast bloggers still believe, however subconsciously, that nothing's "real" unless it emerges from the first thirteen... This may well be where blogs make a difference, by bringing so many others into conversations that were traditionally restricted to the east coast or east and west coasts, and restricted to writers and pundits who could publish via mainstream media. (Note that I understand the objections to that term "mainstream media," but I don't know what to offer in its place.)

The briefest summary was Weinberger's:

The MSM were not univocal in their reaction to the Web and blogs. That's appropriate and it's progress. There are still some who think they "get" blogs because they're using blogs as stringers. But others are genuinely uncertain about the future of mainstream news, which is (imo) also appropriate. They're facing the possiblity of genuine discontinuity.

There's a lot of experimentation on all sides here. Appropriate.

No one knows what the business model(s) will be. Appropriate.

The bloggers didn't have to spend half the morning explaining that most bloggers aren't journalists, that bloggers are in conversation, etc. Progress.

There were still elements of hostility and misunderstanding, especially around the question of accuracy. But there is definitely progress...

jon posted this at 8:48 AM
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Comments

Oh, WAY TO GO, Jon.

Just lump nearly half of the country into one big monolithic "doesn't understand the world as well as WE OVER HERE" do pile.

Come on, you're usually much smarter than to drop such a tribalistic crap-bomb in here.

Posted by: Jason Scott | October 8, 2005 1:54 PM

I didn't say that anybody "doesn't understand the world as well as WE OVER HERE do."

What I said was that mainstream mediasts (and probably some bloggers) on the east coast seem to have just that attitude. It's probably still unfair, as global statements will tend to be, but I was feeling pretty grumpy when I wrote it.

Posted by: Jon Lebkowsky | October 8, 2005 4:37 PM

who are the east coast bloggers you speak of? i mean, is that the narrowest category you can come up with?

Posted by: sean coon | October 8, 2005 4:45 PM