Tuesday, July 12, 2005

John Robinson: "(A)nyone who suggests that newspapers put their reputations at risk by blogging don't understand blogging." He was responding to the WSJ article discussed here. UPDATE: More from JR. 6:41:17 PM   permalink   comment []

erCrunch. True time after time. This one was minor, but it sounded familiar. 4:48:56 PM   permalink   comment []

Wharton: "This isn't the first time that downtown boosters have ignored the advice of nationally-known experts that they themselves have hired...I'd love to believe that things in this city don't work the way that the cynical me thinks they do." 12:23:53 PM   permalink   comment []

Blogger fired for blogging about work. Mickey McLean is sympathetic. His first commenter, not so much. 12:21:48 PM   permalink   comment []

The successful battle against the European Constitution in France was won in part on the Web, reports Le Monde. Opponents used the Internet more effectively than the pro-Brussels camp, with more, richer, and better-respected sites: "Partisans of 'yes' launched only very timidly on these new media." University researchers Franck Ghitalla and Guilhem Fouetillou studied the online campaign and compared the "no" effort to the use of blogs in the last U.S. presidential election. Most of the anti-sites skewed left in political orientation, and independent sites rather than major newspaper or TV networks dominated a list of most authoritative voices on the election. 12:18:40 PM   permalink   comment []

Personal media revolution, nth in a series. Today's chapter about camera phones is by Lenslinger: "Now with the flip of one pudgy wrist, a housewife in the Frozen Foods aisle can capture a shot of the guy with the chops in his socks and instantly zap it to a global information network before she ever hits the check-out lane, giving her time to count her coupons and easily out-broadcast my sorry ass in the process. I may be just a greasy photog, but even I know, THAT'S news." "...These ever-evolving tools may well prove to be the great equalizer in the new media frontier; hand-held, high-tech devices capable of generating new streams of information where not so long ago there was noisy static, and once, only silence." 10:14:58 AM   permalink   comment []

Great story on Martin Eakes in this morning's WSJ (subs req). "Mr. Eakes has gradually transformed himself from an idealist into a pragmatic, influential figure in the $8 trillion home-mortgage industry. Yet 25 years after receiving his law degree from Yale University, Mr. Eakes earns just $60,000 a year, the top pay allowed by the rules of Self-Help. 'I've got one of the best jobs in America,' Mr. Eakes says when asked about his modest income. Compared with what most Americans earn, he adds, 'it's a bunch.'" "...A native of Greensboro, N.C., Mr. Eakes didn't think he would fit in a corporate or bureaucratic organization. He also believed the civil-rights movement wouldn't be complete until African-Americans and other minorities had better economic opportunities." Related. 9:59:44 AM   permalink   comment []

The N&R has been blogging for almost a year. As a reader I find the blogs useful and entertaining. There is some exceptional journalism, and blogging seems to have become an integral part of the job for some reporters and editors. This morning's Wall Street journal has an article (no subs req) called "Should Newspapers Sponsor Blogs Written by Reporters?" My short answer: absolutely. The WSJ looks at SiliconBeat (www.siliconbeat.com), written by Matt Marshall and Michael Bazele of the San Jose Mercury News. "U.S. newspapers are wrestling with whether it is appropriate for reporters to be opining in such forums, and how much, if at all, their posts should be edited. To date, it is relatively rare for newspapers to sponsor reporter-written blogs...Some worry...that newspapers put their reputations at risk by letting reporters blog...Newspapers also may be exposing themselves to legal liability with reporter-written blogs." The N&R's reporter blogs don't come across as opinion pieces. The language is natural, but nobody is shooting from the hip. The bloggers are blogging in their roles as newspaper writers and editors. I wonder what the N&R bloggers think. Is blogging useful to you? Are you happy to be doing it? What rules do you follow on your blog, and how does it differ from other work you do? What about readers -- how do you feel about the N&R blogs? 9:48:21 AM   permalink   comment []