tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15869474.post114323054849366414..comments2023-10-08T07:28:47.872-05:00Comments on Ubikcan: Blogs and investigative journalism, Part 2Unknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger1125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15869474.post-1143664195112089452006-03-29T15:29:00.000-05:002006-03-29T15:29:00.000-05:00derek,Thanks for taking the time to comment. Perha...derek,<BR/><BR/>Thanks for taking the time to comment. Perhaps we do agree on some things. For example, the reason I cite the Post and the NYT is that I used to read (and subscribe) to them and see them as the country's leading newspapers. So it is a particular disappointment to me that they have made significant mis-steps lately, especially the Post which I see as a major player in political coverage.<BR/><BR/>You point to technorati links to good Post stories and that's fine, so allow me to point to the technorati CEO's own blog "<A HREF="http://www.sifry.com/alerts/archives/000420.html" REL="nofollow">Sifry's Alerts"</A>. In that post (and a series last year) he reports on the state of the blogosphere and compares the "MSM" with blogs. It turns out it is a classic power curve (or <A HREF="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long_tail" REL="nofollow">"long tail</A>," "80-20" rule). While CNN, the WaPo and NYT can hold up against any single blog, the effect of the long tail--the vast majority of other political blogs--completely swamps them.<BR/><BR/>As Sifry points out, many links to your work does not necessarily imply quality (he cites the Drudge Report). However--and this is what I've been trying to get at by talking about a shift in political discussions--we can see that the MSM no longer hold a monopoly of influential political discourse.<BR/><BR/>That's the first point. Second, papers like WaPo seem to have committed a number of misteps that indicate both that they don't understand the blogosphere (not very keen on that term but anyway) eg., the recent Ben Domenech debacle, AND as has long been occurring (see Chomsky) they are dominated by corporate, establishment viewpoints that are reluctant to criticize a wildly unpopular president.Ubikcanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15375267879165535965noreply@blogger.com