It's Not All About Hits

John Scalzi has an excellent by-the-numbers (literally) critique of the blogosphere.

Scalzi is a writer with feet planted firmly in media both Old and New, so this is no Beamish bit of bile. It’s honest, it’s searching, and it’s worth your time.

The one point Scalzi I think misses is this: Blogs don’t aim at replacing the New York Times, nor even getting as big as the Gray Lady. We rely on its reporters to get our facts — and we know it.

But who needs a Tom Friedman, a Nick Kristof, or an Alex Beam, when the web can opine and analyze faster, more often, and with greater interaction? And in an age of tailor-made everything, the blogosphere offers — for good or ill — tailor-made punditry.

We’ll never be bigger than the New York Times, but we’re already better-reasoned.