Outlook: The Thing About Blogs
Jennifer Howard
Washington Post Book World Contributing Editor
Monday, November 17, 2003; 2:00 p.m ET
They were supposed to be the ultimate outsider activity, a way for smart kids armed with a computer and an opinion to make their voices heard on matters of the day, even if they didn't have a job at the New York Times or CBS. Instead, blogs have become just another insider's game, writes The Post's Jennifer Howard in her Sunday Outlook piece, It's a Little Too Cozy in the Blogosphere. Bloggers constantly pat each other on the back while routinely pasting their chosen whipping boys and girls -- usually establishment-media types (whose jobs the bloggers perhaps secretly covet?). Bloggers' idiosyncratic, brash, take-no-prisoners approach to commentary can be refreshing and insightful, but all the cronyism and negativity is burning this reader out.
Howard will be online Monday, Nov. 17 at 2 p.m. ET to discuss her article and the blogging phenomenon.
Submit your questions and comments before or during the discussion.
Howard is a contributing editor to The Washington Post Book World.
Editor's Note: washingtonpost.com moderators retain editorial control
over Live Online discussions and choose the most relevant questions for guests and hosts; guests and hosts can decline to answer questions.
Jennifer Howard: Hello everybody, and welcome to today's online discussion of blogging. As I wrote in the WashPost's Outlook section yesterday, I'm finding it a cool, often useful, and increasingly maddening online phenomenon. I'm curious to hear whether you follow blogs, what blogs you're reading and why, and what you think of them and of the way they're evolving. So let's get started.
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Arlington, Va.:
What is a blog? How does one start it and is there ever an end? Thank you.
Jennifer Howard: Blog is a contraction of "web log." It can take a lot of different forms, but the basic idea is that it's a running diary of links and commentary about stuff that the blogger cares about. Which can be anything from today's big news to Dick Cheney's haircut to what the dog ate for breakfast.
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Chantilly, Va.:
Please pardon me for my ignorance.
What is a blog/blogger?
Is a blogger a self proclaimed critic on the Internet?
Please enlighten.
Thanks!
Jennifer Howard: No need to apologize. Blogs have been around for a while, but a lot of people are only just starting to hear about them. And a lot of people won't care anyway--they already have plenty of info sources. If you're curious, though, there's an essay on the history of blogging at www.rebeccablood.net/essays/weblog_history.html. Link courtesy of G. Beato, who runs one of the oldest blogs, soundbitten.com.
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Lyme, Conn.:
I know that "blog" is short for "web log", yet I believe blogs would get a more positive public response if they were called something else. Whenever I mention I have a blog, people respond with well wishes that I recover soon. Perhaps reporting such as yours will inform the public to learn what blogs are. How much confusion do you find people have when they first hear the word "blog?"
Jennifer Howard: Not a lovely word, no. It's like the sound a hunk of mud makes when you throw it at a wall. Not that I do that often. In my experience, people either know what blogs are or they don't, and it doesn't have much to do with the word. (Although my mother-in-law, bless her heart, thought I was talking about "bling," as in "bling-bling," as in the hip-hop term for jewelry.)
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Arlington, Va.:
I am a fan of "political" blogs, but find your analysis also applies to those blogs as well. Read a few days of the most well-known blogs and you will soon realize that they are engaging in lots of metablogging, or talking about who is talking about talking. The blog as personal conversation with other bloggers.
A more fascinating revelation was in evidence just this morning: blog as ego massager. Andrew Sullivan -- who has not had a personal, private thought in a decade -- blogged to another blog who was complimenting Sullivan. In other words, instead of saying "aren't I smart and witty," he blogged to someone else's blog who said "Andrew is smart and witty." Absent, however, are blogs to blogs that say "Andrew is self-absorbed and pedantic," unless of course Andrew's goal is to lift up his own image by critiquing a critique. It's mindboggling self-absorption at its best.
Jennifer Howard: Metablogging--I like it. The ego massager--put it on your Christmas list! That's exactly the problem/tendency I tried to describe in the article, and it's the thing that's been driving me crazy about blogging, and maybe about the culture generally. (I'm sounding like an old crank here, I know. But I'm really not, honest.) At its worst, it devolves into commentary about commentary about commentary, as if there never was anything in the world BUT commentary. Blogs can be very creative, even an art form--there's some great writing out there--but it's a lot easier to sit around and complain than it is to go out there and write a book or make a movie or try to establish a viable third political party. She says as she sits here complaining.
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Harrisburg, Pa.:
Isn't there really a wide range of blog writers? While we see much of the tiring frustrations of youth, perhaps it is better they blow off their steam on the Internet rather than on graffiti walls. In Harrisburg, there already is one state legislator who has become the first legislator to have his own blog (which interests me as a political reader), and, interestingly, instead of using it for the usual boring self-promotions, he is actually writing commentary that, while you may not agree with him, is refreshingly steadfast.
Thus, my question: aren't blogs as good as the writers, and like a library and a book store, you have to find the section that is right for you?
P.S. If anyone else is interested, the blog I refer to is at phillyblog.com. I'll let readers find it from there rather than promote the individual (and, if the moderator prefers, this portion may be deleted from the question if it is not appropriate.)
Jennifer Howard: It's ENORMOUS. Enormousenormousenormous. My blogger friend The Antic Muse (yes, I have a blogger friend, if she's still speaking to me) sent me a link this morning to a blog-tracking site called Technorati (www.technorati.com). It's currently following 1,230,850 blogs. That's a staggering number. No wonder most people have only heard of a handful, if they're heard of them at all.
"Refreshingly steadfast" is a great thing in a blog. As you suggest, a blog is only as good as the blogger, and you have to find the ones that fit--or that provoke you in some interesting ways. The trick is finding them--with more than a million choices out there, how do you do it? That's where the blog-to-blog links do come in handy; find a site you like, see what that blogger likes, and chances are you'll expand your own favorites list.
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Capitol Hill, Washington, D.C.:
You made a reference to the "verbing of names" in your article. I, however, enjoyed your verbing of "verb." Very nice. I'm all for neologizing.
Jennifer Howard: Thanks. I don't think I can claim original credit for that one, but I'm happy to try.
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Snekkersten, Denmark:
Hi Jennifer -- read your article about cosiness in the blogosphere. To me, being outside an American context but inside WWW, your comment seem a little too wrapped up in your own references. Aren't you just commenting on a small closed corner of the blogosphere? A corner of your own choice? Have you lifted your eyes from the blogs of fame that you obviously are referring, and subscribing, to?
One could look at this "state" of the blogosphere you are referring to, as a natural development in a world whose primary drive is personal success and wealth.
I mean -- popular blogs are turned into businesses as they, because of their popularity and their growing traffic, attract advertisers. An old, and these days not so popular, German philosopher by the name of Karl Marx talked about what he called the growing logical status of capital.
With this term he posed a hypothesis that an increasingly number of aspects in life would be capitalized, meaning being turned into activities of profit.
In my view this hypothesis can be applied to the world of blogs. Look aroud you, and you will find a strong example of this in the music industry. These days rap and hip-hop have taken over and become the language of popular music. But once the thrill is gone (as BB King sings)... What happens then you have an example of in the rocking days of punk-music. Have you ever seen the amazing film "The Great Rock & Roll Swindle?"
If you want to find blogs in the sense you are mourning the loss of, try some of the not so fancy, not so visited sites. My guess is you have a surprise waiting for you. Just as you get a surprise if you go to small, alternative, not so well-known or established clubs for a musical treat.
With these well-meant comments I wish a good hunt in cyberspace.
Yours sincerely/The Dane
Jennifer Howard: Hello, Denmark. Karl Marx blogging--now that's a concept. Yes, I did confine myself in the piece to looking at a handful of blogs. Unlike bloggers, I only had 1200 words in which to sound off, so I had to keep the piece focused in order to make my point. (I should add that I look at more blogs than the 4 or 5 mentioned in the piece, I just didn't have room to say so.) And like anybody I can only read a fraction of those million-plus blogs out there. The self-referential temptations are there for bloggers on almost any subject, though.
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Alexandria, Va.:
So, how many of the bloggers that you named have now written about your editorial? Have the comments been positive or negative? I'm assuming here that the blogger grapevine is as fast as most office grapevines.
Jennifer Howard: Just about all of them, and their friends, and the friends of their friends, and the enemies of the friends of their friends. I've temporarily displaced Laura Miller as the hate-on of the moment. By tomorrow they'll have forgotten the whole thing. It's been interesting to see just how fast something like this spreads--it's jumped from the lit blogs to the political blogs (more favorable reaction there, interestingly enough) and even to some Christian blogs. God help me.
If you're really curious, this link from Technorati--again courtesy of The Antic Muse, who's probably ticked off that I didn't mention her URL (it's www.theanticmuse.com, and feel free to accuse me of blogrolling)--tracks the responses so far.
http://www.technorati.com/cosmos/links.html?PHPSESSID=7a3935338f7b04b9e42f0884fc339728&rank=&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.washingtonpost.com%2Fwp-dyn%2Farticles%2FA43254-2003Nov14.html
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Fredericksburg, Va.:
Jennifer, I recently read about the blog "A Marine's Girl" (or something like that) shutting down because of vitriolic comments by those who opposed her views. Fine, that's her choice to cut and run. My question is... how does the blogosphere keep itself fresh and relevant without being polluted by "establishment" types? Disclaimer: I am hopelessly addicted to Daily Kos, Eschaton, Talking Points Memo and Political Aims.
Jennifer Howard: I'll have to check those out. As for how the blogosphere keeps itself fresh, it's up to the bloggers to keep an eye on the navel-gazing and realize when it's getting out of hand. Assuming they want people to keep reading, that is. Which I think they do. And maybe some hidebound old-media types like me can help by writing snarky articles about them from time to time.
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Tucson, Ariz.:
I suggest this Howard check out the blog of another Howard. While I cannot speak for other blogs, I have to completely disagree, Ms. Howard, as far as the only blog I frequent... Howard Dean's. None of us "secretly covet" the glorified prostitute jobs of the media we criticize. A good many of us are not even Democrats, and certainly aren't part of "another insider's game." That is exactly the point! We weren't part of anything institutional, and what Dean's blog gives us is a chance to connect, share opinions, argue, dissent... all in the manner we had wished our mainstream media would present differing view points. I personally was as anti-political, anti-party as you can get and now am a registered Democrat and a Dean volunteer -- all due to the enthusiasm of fellow Dean bloggers. Keep scratching your heads and espousing your pious criticisms -- it is what we have come to expect from our American media. Meanwhile, we will continue to connect our community through simple old-fashioned conversation and give Americans a real voice in the political process.
Jennifer Howard: Ah, a Dean plug disguised as a comment! Go for it.
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New Rochelle, N.Y.:
I read Atrios, blah3, and many lefty blogs because they provide links to alternative sites. I find the mainstream media has been silenced or aren't reporting like they did because they all have business pending before the FCC. I read my blogs after I check the Guardian or the BCC for American news.
Jennifer Howard: I'm a big fan of the Guardian's, too. Great literary/cultural coverage.
Often blogs are where you have to go to get uncensored--sorry, unfiltered--commentary on certain subjects. I don't know enough about the FCC situation to comment, but it's an intriguing theory. Again, the trick is finding blogs you can reliably trust to balance out what the mainstream media's presenting. What you find reliable will of course depend on your political bent and a lot of other things.
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Springfield, Va.:
Does one need to own a Web site before submitting a "blog?"
How does one begin a "blog" assuming that he already knows what he wants to say?
I have a lot of questions concerning the "blog."
Jennifer Howard: You and me both. (Questions, nothing but questions.)
If you want to find out how to set up a blog, there are several sites that will explain how to do it and set you up. Check out Blogger (http://new.blogger.com/home.pyra)and Movable Type (www.movabletype.com). I haven't done it myself--my website isn't a blog (although a lot of the angry bloggers seem to think it is--and the URL is www.jenniferhoward.com, for all you pesky people who keep e-mailing me to ask, go figure).
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Washington, D.C.:
Instapundit, probably the biggest of all the big blogs, wrote about your article "THE BLOGOSPHERE IS, LIKE, TOTALLY INBRED: Er, except that I haven't ever heard of most of these blogs, which are nonetheless a big thing in their part of the sphere, I gather.
There are more things in the blogosphere, Jennifer Howard, than are dreamt of in your articles..."
What is your response?
Jennifer Howard: Hey, I know you! You already e-mailed me. Perhaps our Danish friend will enjoy your Hamlet paraphrase (which you recycled from your e-mail, if I recall rightly). I'm not an Instapundit fan. You clearly are. Enough said.
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Falls Church, Va.:
Jennifer,
I discovered the blogosphere about 18 months ago, did some guest writing for one of the bigger blogs and now have one of my own. You're right, it's both cool and maddening, both a self-re-enforcing echo chamber and one of the best ways to educate yourself on topics that are unfamiliar. I know a great deal more about economics and Iraq than I would have been able to gather on my own. What's your favorite feature of this phenomenon?
Jennifer Howard: Echo chamber's a nice way of putting it.
For me, the best thing has been grassroots information. ("Grassroots" is a dumb ChemLawn kind of word but I can't think of something pithier now.) I had gotten really frustrated with the limitations of the literary coverage in the usual places (NYT, New Yorker, that kind of thing. It felt like a closed shop. Bloggers helped break down the walls and let me know what people who actually buy and read books are reading, talking about etc. And what they think about what the professional critics are saying. They can be really good watchdogs for us old-media types. I'll stop using that phrase now.
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Cubicleville:
I recently found the DC Metro Blog Map.
Thought I would be in for hours upon hours of great reading. Realized that most of the blogs made me want to gouge my own eyes out -- unbelievably boring stuff out there. What combination of factors, in your opinion, makes for good blogging?
Jennifer Howard: Please, please don't gouge your eyes out. They're not worth it.
Good blogging? As with porn, I know it when I see it. (Note to my mother: That was a figure of speech.) Let's see--snappy writing, links to things I want to know about, enough attitude to let me know who's writing but not so much that it becomes the whole point of the exercise. That's a starter list.
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Washington, D.C.:
I enjoyed your essay on blogs. Yet, I had to think, as I read it, "Boy, she is in for it now." Were you worried at all that by writing about blogs, you would find yourself a blog target? As you probably already know, some bloggers are like dogs with a bone when it comes to (real or perceived) criticism. TMFTML already has some snarky commentary up...
Jennifer Howard: The reactions have been about what I expected. TMFTML's was one of the funnier ones, I thought, and not as predictable at most. I've had a few bad flashbacks to 7th grade when Alex Buhler (oops, did I type her name?) cornered me outside the cafeteria and said "We're gonna get you!" But mostly I don't mind. As my friend Malcolm says (no, I'm not going to give his URL), if you don't make somebody made, you're not doing something right.
Seriously, though, if the article makes them think a little harder about what they're doing and what it means for readers, it'll have done its job. Like most writers, I'm just happy somebody's reading my stuff, even if they hate me.
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Fredericksburg, Va.:
Jennifer,
I have been an avid reader of blogs for a couple of years now. I mainly read political blogs (mostly liberal but some conservative.) I find the medium allows political addicts, like me, to really keep their ears to the ground in races that the national media isn't paying much attention to. Its like being on a big phone party line. The cool thing about blogs are that they don't demand anything from readers -- if you don't want to post you can choose to be a lurker. Of course, there are blogs that don't have comment boards (like Talking Points Memo.)
Jennifer Howard: See, bloggers, a satisfied customer! This is the grassroots thing I was talking about.
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Another Cubeville Inhabitant, Md.:
Perhaps it is your choice in blogs, either authors or subject matter.
Have you ever read Julie Powell -- The Julie/Julia Project?
She has a piece in Bon Appetit this month, and a book deal.
It reads like a favorite author, throwing it all down, for my amusement.
Surely there must be others with quality, not quantity.
Jennifer Howard: Don't know Julie. As I keep saying, though, there are lots of good sites out there, you just have to find them. Even the ones I beat up on in the article often have good stuff to offer. There are some, too, that are more clearinghouses than commentary, and those can be especially good--I'm thinking of Arts and Letters Daily, for instance, though like everything it too has a bias if you know how to spot it. (They'll link to any article that debunks global warming, for instance.) URL is www.aldaily.com if you're curious. Another good one, for the lit folk, is Moby Lives, www.mobylives.com, which keeps the snark and self-referencing to a minimum but still maintains a lively presence.
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Baltimore, Md.:
Great piece!
There are definitely communities and cliques a-flourishin' in the blogging world. I don't keep one, myself, since I don't really care to share the minutiae of my daily existence, and it's so much easier to inflict my media-oriented rants on friends n' family.
I started following a few blogs regularly after stumbling upon Fametracker and Television Without Pity, the brilliant TV recap/forum site. Many of TWOP's organizers and site moderators have their own blogs (some of which have grown into mini-industries) or link to people who do. One site, with a name that is essentially unprintable in a family newspaper (D-mn H-ll -ss Kings) serves as a clearinghouse for some of the blogs I frequent.
It starts to get tiresome, though, when bloggers engage in a little too much back-patting; or, when wanna-be bloggers start soliciting advice on making it from the more well established.
Jennifer Howard: Thank you! Much appreciated.
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Bangor, Maine:
Hello Jennifer.
Know what I think? People have waay too much time on their hands. Commemts?
Jennifer Howard: Can't argue with that.
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Falls Church, Va.:
I see that you still visit the same bloggers, but now are criticizing some of their relatively minor traits. Obviously, the vast majority of bloggers are going to be attention-seeking personalities, which are the same type that are going to be dropping names and using their fora for self-aggrandizement. Maybe in a perfect world all bloggers would be single-mindedly committed to making our reading experiences as efficient as possible, but since this is not a perfect world, shouldn't we just be thankful for what we get, which is a vast improvement over (or at least a great alternative to) the mainstream media?
Jennifer Howard: I disagree that these are minor traits. They can be a deal-breaker, at least for this reader. But I'm still grateful blogs are out there.
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A blog in my future, Virginia?:
What thoughts would you have for someone who actually wanted to write a blog, even for just his own amusement? Also, in defense of Andrew Sullivan, he is one of my favorite bloggers though I don't share all of his views.
Jennifer Howard: Have fun with it but keep in mind what you're hoping to accomplish with it. Do you just want an outlet where you can rant to your heart's content, no matter who's reading or whether anybody is? Or are you hoping to establish a forum that people will turn to for a certain take on things?
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Washington, D.C..:
I read your article anticipating discussion of the flap created by Greg Easterbrook's webblog entry about Hollywood execs. Is offending people the cost of doing business with blogspots? Was the lesson of Easterbrook that while journalists love to apply the "one strike your out rule" to members of Congress et al., they might hesitate now that it applies also to journalists?
Jennifer Howard: I think a lot of journalists are embarrassed for Gregg Easterbrook. He kinda let down the team. At least that's what I'm hearing. He should have known better--or run his copy by somebody, especially since his blog had a New Republic connection. It makes me wonder what the New Republic was thinking. But then I often wonder what the New Republic is thinking.
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Palookaville:
As a long-term blogreader, I agree that the mutual congratulation ("blogrolling," as someone christened it) gets a bit old. Leaving that out, the cross-referencing is helpful. I read Teachout daily, but seldom check out TMFTML (or is it TMLTMF?). When Teachout points out something noteworthy on TM-whatever, though, I will often click over. Thus, Teachout's cross-referencing serves as a sort of filter, or watchdog, or timesaver for me.
Jennifer Howard: They're kind of like a clipping service, the good ones.
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Santa Fe, N.M.:
Sorry, but this isn't really a question...
I'm fresh into the blog thing, only a couple of months of lurking, and I find myself regularly at only a few sites. Like everything else about the Internet, there is a lot of crap, and a few places that are outstanding. Right now, there is an ongoing discussion at dailyKos concerning the struggle for the soul of the Democratic Party, focussing on the alleged Dean/DLC rift. The majority of comments being posted are articulate and insightful, showing real thought going on about the issues. There is nothing else that comes close to the immediacy of the discourse available to folks who want to examine current issues.
Blogs are a new incarnation of the forum, the ancient tradition of a community place where the issues of the day can be discussed. Granted, few blogs reach the high level of discourse available at the best of them, but to attempt to dismiss the blog phenom because not all participants are as articulate as we would wish, or that some posters do waste a lot of bytes, is to miss the point. Democracy is about talking together. Blogs provide a new and utterly immediate way to talk together.
People are talking together like never before, and in this lies the salvation of democracy, messy as it may be.
Rather than casting your journalistic jaundiced eye upon the Blogosphere and finding it wanting, it might serve your readers better to point them to a few places that stand out. To hear real political discourse going on, not between talking heads, but between citizens who are thinking and struggling to find solutions, and to be able to interact with them, is what we need more of. We have enough talking heads.
Jennifer Howard: Hey, I'm not dissing blogging. I think it's great. Just easily corrupted.
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Dulles, Va.:
So, aside from the clear liberal bias in your piece, I thought your piece raised some good points. Sometimes the inside jokes of a small group of blogs can be alienating -- the way it's off-putting to go out with a group of people who've been friends for a long time. But when it comes to the specific blogs you mention in the article, I wonder if you've focused on the negative a little too strongly -- you admit yourself that you started reading the blogs because you enjoy them. There is a dearth of good writing in the blogosphere, the writers you menion are good -- shouldn't they get some props for setting a standard, even if they occassionally get carried away with back-scratching? Also: why didn't you mention me?
Jennifer Howard:
As a member of the left-wing media conspiracy, I can't comment on that. Link you later.
Thanks to everybody who logged on and weighed in. Good discussion. See you in the blogosphere, maybe.
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