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Snark by Snarkwest: Bloggers v. Journalists
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I’m flying my journalism colors for a little bit, liveblogging Jay Rosen’s solo presentation: “Bloggers vs. Journalists: It’s a Psychological Thing.” If you haven’t yet, read Jay’s introductory post: “Why Bloggers v. Journalists Is Still With Us.”

Here’s the session description: “I wrote my essay, Bloggers vs. Journalists is Over, in 2005. And it should be over. After all, lots of journalists happily blog, lots of bloggers journalize and everyone is trying to figure out what’s sustainable online. But there’s something else going on: these two Internet types, amateur bloggers and pro journalists, are actually each other’s ideal “other.” A big reason they keep struggling with each other lies at the level of psychology, not in the particulars of the disputes and flare-ups that we continue to see online. The relationship is essentially neurotic, on both sides. Bloggers can’t let go of Big Daddy media— the towering figure of the MSM — and still be bloggers. Pro journalists, meanwhile, project fears about the Internet and loss of authority onto the figure of the pajama-wearing blogger. This is a construction of their own and a key part of a whole architecture of denial that has weakened in recent years, but far too slowly.”

The sole speaker is Jay Rosen; the esteemed Lisa Williams is helping with the setup and backchannel. And without further ado:

3 comments

Tim Carmody says…

Sorry, our handsome friend here needed a bath.

On the one hand, I don’t really want to start defining or redefining journalism, at least in any positive sense, because I don’t really know how to do that. Besides value-neutral descriptions like “journalism is research that leads to timely publishing or broadcasting information for a wide audience” that cause as many problems as they solve, anyways.

So I’ll change that discussion in two ways. Instead of asking what journalism is, let’s ask what we – as readers, writers, editors, citizens, publishers – want from journalism.

Once we do this, then we see (I think) that it’s less about what we do want (which includes sports scores and celebrity gossip as much as public policy discussons) than what we don’t.

And what we want from journalism, I think, is a sense that the journalist isn’t trying to snow us, and that they’ve made every effort not to be snowed by others or snow themselves, for their own or someone else’s benefit.

We also want it to be fast, free of careless mistakes, and engaging.

That’s it.

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Thanks Matt! I almost felt like I was there.

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