Live From Blogworld: The Political Blogosphere in Transition
Here at the 2008 Blogworld and New Media Expo, there is plenty of evidence that rapid change in the blogosphere will alter the way that bloggers blog and the news consumer gets information.
The key is content. The way content is delivered, the way in which it is used by the blogger, and the way a blog community digests it and disseminates it further is driving the innovations in blogs, extending their influence, and ultimately changing the manner by which people get information
The growth of video, spurred on by YouTube and other video sites as well as blogging platforms that have become user friendly for uploading audio and video to a webpage, has created nothing less than a revolution in blogging. In fact, the changes that are occurring are so sweeping that the terms “blog” and “blogging” — at least the way those terms are generally understood now — may be anachronistic.
In the political blogosphere, Crooks and Liars on the left and HotAir on the right have become top rated sites largely devoted to airing videos of the latest political news. Successful bloggers have incorporated video segments into their blogposts, sharing with their readers the impact that a visual accompaniment has on a story.
One recent example was the effect a video taken by a blogger had on the presidential race. A diarist at the conservative Redstate.com happened to be sitting on an airplane behind former Democratic National Committee chief Don Fowler and John Spratt, a prominent Democrat from South Carolina. Unbeknownst to the two politicians, the diarist began filming their conversation — a dialogue that showed them talking despairingly of Sarah Palin and chuckling about the GOP’s bad luck in having Hurricane Gustav make landfall just when their convention was getting underway.
The video became a sensation largely driven by bloggers who forced the mainstream media to cover the story. Fowler and Spratt eventually apologized, but in the public’s mind, the former DNC chairman was associated with the Obama campaign and it appeared that the men were unmindful of the suffering caused by the hurricane.
When I began blogging four years ago, “blogs” were little more than hobbies for most, albeit an addictive, all consuming hobby. Content was derived almost exclusively from the mainstream media and The Great Game was to catch the MSM in some revealing falsehood or obviously biased statement. The press yowled in protest whenever a particularly incisive critique made its way from blogs to other mainstream news outlets. They weren’t used to the kind of scrutiny given by bloggers back then, and their sensitivity revealed the cocoon in which the MSM wrapped itself.
Today, content is far more diversified. Largely because with the growth of the internet, there has been an explosion of content driven sites that cater to blogs and deliver information in many different ways. Many of these sites are connected to old media — most newspapers today have several blogs devoted to everything from politics to entertainment — and many of these bloggers/journalists offer opinions, do original reporting, add video, audio, access to online data bases, and, in many cases, link to a newspaper archive of riches that any blogger hungry for content can download to their heart’s content.
The sad irony is that some elements of the right, like libertarians, jumped on the whole blog thing with enthusiasm. They were followed by the left and conservatives (in both the US & the UK) were very slow to get it. The non-libertarian right in the US still seem to be playing catch up with the whole new media thing.
The problem with his idea is that libertarian and conservative bloggers deal in ideas, not invective for the most part. They share hobbies, humor, and usually facts. While liberals turn people off with their smears, the right tends to make friends.
Most sane people who visit a leftist blog will never return, as they are turned off by the profanity and rabid nature of many of the contributors, not to mention the lack of ideas and substantiated fact. Some of the Libertarian blogs mirror the left with their own mouth-foaming, attack-dog postings and commentary. Knowledgeable people prefer sites where civilized discourse prevails, where ideas, reason and civility confront sophomoric lunacy…..and where the fool and his inane gibberish are exposed and sent packing.
Where liberals seemed to have been motivated to organize by a yearning to get back into power, conservatives preferred a more disciplined and individualistic approach. As Rob Nepell pointed out, some conservative efforts to mirror the left have been successful, including the “Porkbusters” project but that by and large, conservatives remain a community of individuals.
It seems to me there is an argument that the political blogosphere has evolved in a manner that mirrors fundamental ideas of each side. While “conservatives remain a community of individuals.” the left sides seems much more centralized, monolithic and hive-like.
Saltherring:
“…and where the fool and his inane gibberish are exposed and sent packing.”
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Well that is good.
In what country is that happening?
Certainly not in countries with capitalists and christians starring as the ‘right’…
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Truth: a horrible thing.
In response to my earlier posting where I stated “….and the fool and his inane gibberish are exposed and sent packing.”, fp asks, “In what country is that happening?”. My response is that it happens daily on Pajamas Media, and even though you display contempt for countries where “capitalists and christians” are present, I’m certain you will find satisfaction in posting your communist and atheistic/agnostic/satanic viewpoints. And there are many here who will find great satisfaction in sending you and your ideas packing.
I stop reading any blog which is dominated by ideological thinking. The echo chambers turn me off. On the left I really like the UK Normblog and on the right Belmont Club. Each makes me think in new ways. Real Clear Politics has more from both the left and right than I have time to read from the national press and the best polling information available. Certainly RCP’s Jay Cost is the most astute analyst of polling I have ever encountered. The infusion of audio and video creates a whole new definition of blogospere because it changes the previous print dominated blogosphere. It may be that this will lead to a recapitulation of the 20th century progression from print to radio to TV. However I would predict that it will lead to the proliferation of many new modes of relating, because the structure of the web is ‘many to many’ rather ‘few to many’ like the mass media.
Video = Propaganda
“Rock journalism is people who can’t write interviewing people who can’t talk for people who can’t read.”
Frank Zappa, quoted in Linda Botts, “Loose Talk” (1980)
US musician, singer, & songwriter (1940 – 1993)
What gives blogs their power is the relatively unrestricted feedback (interactivity). What is killing the MSM is their lack of feedback. Generation ‘X’ is more interactive then any generation before it. I blame/credit video games.
The MSM was created to force feed entertainment pabulum to the Laziest Generation. Generation ‘X’ was raised on video games, not Movies nor soap operas. So they expect to interact with their entertainment.
This is killing both Hollweed and the MSM. The clowns running these mega-entertainment outlets are not comfortable with interacting with their customers, so they are mistaking the medium for the message. After all for the last several decades, they have preached the the Medium IS the message. They cannot let go of that false concept that underpins their entire existence, so they are fighting back by trying to co-op the medium. Converting blogs to video-driven Propaganda outlets is just one way to reestablish control and get rid of that pesky interactivity thingie.
“I read no newspaper now but Ritchie’s, and in that chiefly the advertisements, for they contain the only truths to be relied on in a newspaper.”
Thomas Jefferson, Letter to Nathaniel Macon, January 12, 1819
3rd president of US (1743 – 1826)
In a way, conservative and liberal blogs both became a locus for ideas and information that was ignored or misreported by the main stream media.
Conservatives rallied to fight the liberal bias of the media – especially in the 2004 presidential campaign.
Liberals already have the media promoting their ideas, which may be why the left wing blogs are far more extreme than the conservative blogs. Only the more extreme left is unrepresented in the MSM, so they are the ones spending energy on the web.
I troll regularly on Kos and HuffPo, and although I am diametrically opposed to everything they believe, I am in awe of format, content, and professionalism of both. They are MILES ahead of Malkin.com, HotAir, etc.
I have no doubt that you are also a frequent stealth-guest (as am I) of these sites. We need to play catch-up fast.
The internet resources on the “right” already exist but have been effectively silenced. Religious groups such as Catholic.com used to have forums for discussing yes, even politics. This election year, however, their forum has forbidden discussion about politics due to pressure from anti-Christian and anti-faith groups who threaten to sue the organizations that provide the infrastructure for (supposedly free) exchange of ideas.
Most people on the right live in a multidimensional universe that includes more than just pure politics. Because of this, “right-leaning” forums and blogs are far more diverse in their focus. Typically, faith provides the lens through which we view the world and our internet offerings reflect that spirituality.
The reason why left-leaning blogs are so unappealing is because they are so secular and shallow. If your reason for existence is political, then your existence is low, limited, and ugly.
The answer is not to create new sites that simply ape this vapid and mean-spirited worldview because this will only lower the level of “debate” and hasten the demise of the union from within.
Because we already have (had!) the infrastructure, the answer is to argue that our right to debate the issues using the same media they use is just as protected as theirs.
Rick,
I attended the same session. I actually laughed out loud at the question/comment about how conservative bloggers are unified and regimented (the authoritarian personality canard). Liberal bigots.
One thing that gets lost by focusing solely on the blogosphere (it’s hard to draw distinctions anymore, e.g. PJM), is ignoring how the conservative movement were early adopters of the internet. WorldNetDaily, FreeRepublic and FrontPageMag blazed a trail that conservative bloggers were able to follow later on. Conservative think tanks also began the move towards posting everything online (I attended a NCPA conference on public policy and the Internet conference in 1997). Townhall made the shift to 2.0 to become what it is today.
I almost wanted to get up and make the observation about how blogs have arrived with the example of the announcement of the Supreme Court’s Heller decision. The SCOTUSblog provided minute-by-minute updates from inside the courtroom – something the lamestream media wasn’t able to do. Everyone I know was watching the updates at the blog, not looking at CNN, etc. That is the future.
Honestly, Blogworldexpo has been a bit of a disappointment. It was good to meet some of the PJM folks and others, but the sessions haven’t really had much meat on the bones. A lot of preaching to the choir.
And where in the hell are the PJM girls this year?! Roger?
to RICK:
why should the right blogosphere become the same socialistically “organized” = faceless and brainless sheeple like the left one? They are ants, we are INDIVIDUALS. That’s what is precious in the right blogosphere. Everybody is different. Only here you can learn the REAL tolerance. They all think and act the same way. We are all different (and not in a Monty Python’s way). Why should WE be like THEM, brainwashed sectists with no individuality? It’s very easy to organize sheeple. It’s difficult to find so many INDIVIDUALS as you can find in AMERICA. That’s precious in America. Keep it like this! Don’t try to change it. Organized people are everywhere: Cuba, China, Saudi Arabia etc. A lot of INDIVIDUALS – you can find it only in America (and maybe in Israel, but it’s another story). INDIVIDUALS OF AMERICA, DON’T UNITE!
I don’t visit leftist sites much since they offer little that makes sense to me. One exception is The Oil Drum which has a least some grip on reality in some of the posts although the leftists and doomsday crowd can be VERY rude. One could make a blanket statement that leftists seem exclusionary to ideas while right wing blogs are willing to talk things over politely. Exceptions do occur both ways though.
I do find that center-right blogs are individualistic in the the owners have a proprietary interest in their fame, readership, and growth. I feel funny when I reference an American Thinker piece in a comment on Belmont Club, for example – is that kosher?
The owners seem entrepreneurs on a shoe string while the big lefty blogs seem better capitalized. Maybe the Right needs a sugar daddy like George Soros?
As to video, I’m not excited. I can read anytime but watching a video means I’m locked into the presentation’s pace. Plus you have to listen which can be difficult – like at work!
Michael B., that is eye candy. Something they do to hide the lack of content. As we say in my neck of the woods, “If it don’t run, chrome it.”
DU and Kos banned me long ago. I didn’t bother to change my IPN, since there is no point in talking to those that refuse to listen. Huffy doesn’t give me am ‘access denied’ code, they just delete my posts. I fisked an article by some starlet with a hot body and cold synapses and now all my posts vanish within an hour or so.
Samizdata was at least polite about it. I observed that a capitalist was someone with a healthy checking account balance, a socialist was someone without a checking account and a libertatian was someone with an overdrawn checking account. I thought that was clever and not very outrageous, but they took umbrage and asked me to stop posting, so I did. I’m going to wait until the Muslims take over and ban them to make a final post.
See how I am?
Had to laugh at Michael b, the self-confessed troll. Praise for the content and professionalism of the Daily Kos and HuffPo? If he thinks those sewer rats and smear merchants show professionalism and superior content, then I pray Malkin and Hot Air never attain such lofty staus. Mr. Moran, this article’s author, is a self-described libertarian, as is Instapundit’s Glenn Reynolds. Both of these gentlemen seem to be liberals at heart. Mr. Moran often writes hopefully it seems of an Obama victory, as if to punish conservatives. Instapundit’s posted features on 9/10/01 praising both Andrew Sullivan and the ACLU. Could someone tell me exactly what is a libertarian?
Joe, I didn’t mean to praise KOS or HuffPo content. I just like to see what the other side is thinking. So, let’s put aside the fact that they are indeed, sewer rats and smear merchants. Apart from the content, simply look at the format and features of the site… they are miles ahead of the sites that I mentioned (not withstanding Rush’s excellent site, which I refuse to pay a fee to get the “full access”- its not the money, its the principle). I love HotAir, but the site is amateurish compared. That was my only point.
I’ve tried to spend time in Left Blogistan, but it’s pretty harsh in there. I don’t care for profanity, but I have no patience with “groupthink.” I’m looking for ideas I couldn’t come up with on my own, and I seldom find much worth looking for on the left.
By contrast, I find a lot to listen to on the right side of the blogosphere. It really is a “big tent,” complete with Creationists, drug-legalizers, gay Republicans, Ron Paul supporters, etc. (There are also tons of trolls from the left.)
I’ve observed that Left Blogistan keeps coming up with ABSURD conspiracy theories–and then hangs on to them despite an impossible amount of evidence to the contrary. By contrast, the “pajamaheedin” have been pretty consistent about nailing bad guys (Dan Rather’s “Memogate” was the first, David Kernell’s hack of Palin’s email is the latest, and there have been lots of examples in between.)
From what I can see, the Left Blogosphere is weak on information processing, high on coerced conformity. It may be more powerful than the right side of cyberspace, but is less accurate. In the short run, power beats intelligence (see man v. saber-tooth tiger), but in the long run, ingtelligence beats power (see man v. saber-tooth tiger). I’m betting on the pajamaheedin!
Want a sneak peek of an Obama presidency? Let’s see, which segment of society’s ideas, values (and people) would set the standard? The Leftist Blogistan probably gives a good indication.
Thank you for the civil and reasonable reply Michael B. Now, would someone elucidate on the question: what is a libertarian?
would someone elucidate on the question: what is a libertarian?
A Socialist with an overdrawn checking account.
“Communism is like one big phone company.”
Lenny Bruce
(1923 – 1966)
In hopes that Lenny won’t start spinning in his grave;
‘Libertarinism is like a small phone company’.
All joking aside, libertarianism is like pornography, you know it when you see it.