Sunday, November 02, 2008

Non-MSM reporting

I've read some people claiming that bloggers will replace reporters. More thoughtful folks point out that although particular bloggers have specialized information no reporter is likely to be able to match, there's no reliability built into the blogging model, and people aren't usually all that interested in showing up to and blogging about the court docket or the school board committee meetings. You have to pay reporters to do those kinds of things.

And the blogging model may collapse soon anyway. If the economy tanks, Google won't be able to make ends meet with advertising. Bye-bye free blogging. And bye-bye unmetered research access too! Google et al will either shrivel to pay-as-you-go research engines, or be nationalized (and presumably made unprovocative(*), except for the favored groups). This dries up the gigantic pool of information those over-optimistic forecasters are counting on.

(*)No porn links and no hate group links, for instance. Of course both categories are subject to regulator interpretation. The Canadian HRC illustrates how.

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