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A Blogger Symposium On The Media & The Blogosphere
by John Hawkins
Thanks to Juan Gato from The Shallow End, Susanna Cornett from Cut On The Bias, N.Z. Bear from The Truth Laid Bear, & Eugene Volokh from The Volokh Conspiracy for participating in our latest symposium. Read & enjoy!
John Hawkins: Let's start with one of the most controversial questions first. Do you think the media leans to the left, the right, or is fair and balanced?
Eugene Volokh: If by 'the media,' you mean most newspapers and TV programs, the answer is left.
Susanna Cornett: In its effect, I think the majority of the media goes to the left.
N.Z. Bear: I think my gut answer to the question was 'yes'. I tend to think it's all over the map; it's a bit hard to generalize.But overall, I'd find it hard to argue that the major mainstream news outlets tend to go leftwards.
Juan Gato: Though it is a large thing, I'll say in general the objective center I see from them is left of what I see as the objective center.
John Hawkins: Well then why do you think people like Eric Alterman believe the media leans to the right?
Susanna Cornett: I think something Bernard Goldstein said in his book 'Bias' is true. A lot of the left-leaning is a result of who the journalists are, rather than a studied ideology in media and that means that where you stand affects where you think the media is. To Alterman, I'd say Chomsky is a bit suspiciously rightish at times.
N.Z. Bear: I'll restrain myself from an overly-snarky response and say 'I just don't know'. Other than to say that even if we all agree that the media is 'left of center', if Alterman is far enough left of THAT, then he'll naturally have a tendency to perceive it as rightward.
John Hawkins: So basically because the press isn't screaming to Bush, 'Why did you use cocaine and go AWOL!' & 'tell us the truth about the Bush Family Evil Empire', lefties see it as too Conservative?
Eugene Volokh: I haven't read Eric Alterman enough to know why he thinks so; but in general, (1) people tend to think that they're sweet reason and the essence of moderation, and thus measure everyone in comparison to themselves; and (2) people notice and remember things that outrage them more than things they agree with, so even if the media has a rightward bias in 10% of the cases and a leftward bias in 50% of the cases, people of the left may remember the 10% and ignore the 50% (which will look to them just like the media being correct, which isn't very noteworthy).
N.Z. Bear: I think it's been widely observed that the left --- or parts of it --- have become increasingly shrill in the past few years (basically since the 2000 election) and rather obsessed with Bush as the center of all evil. Once you wrap your world view around the core idea that the guy in the White House shouldn't be there & everything starts to get distorted through that prism. (To mangle a metaphor).
Eugene Volokh: As to shrillness though, there are shrill people on the left and shrill people on the right. I'd be hesitant to claim that there are more of one than of the other, unless I had a relatively methodical survey in hand.
N.Z. Bear: Agreed, Eugene. But would you agree that the left is, by and large, being more 'shrill' than the right these days?
John Hawkins: I'd agree that there are shrill people on the right as well but, I don't for example hear a lot of people on the right claiming that talk radio leans to the left or that Fox is a lefty network. That's why I think there's a difference in perceptions.
N.Z. Bear: I think the best statement of this lately (in the blogosphere, at least) was by Jane Galt; she proposed Jane's Law, which I happen to have handy. ('Jane's Law: The devotees of the party in power are smug and arrogant. The devotees of the party out of power are insane.' I think the being-out-of-power thing has a natural tendency to make either side more negative and shrill.
Susanna Cornett: Well, the right is arguably in power now and still there is a strong voice saying the media leans left which I don't think is particularly different from how people saw the media when Clinton was president.
Juan Gato: The side out of power probably feels a need to yell louder precisely because they feel without power they won't be heard.
John Hawkins: I think the media leans left everywhere but Fox on TV & in almost all the newspapers. The right dominates talk radio and Fox, and the net is a grab bag.
John Hawkins: Let's change the subject a bit -- do you think the
New York Times is in trouble?
Susanna Cornett: Yes, depending on what you mean by 'trouble'.
John Hawkins: Heh, no Bill Clinton answers here Susanna =).
Susanna Cornett: Lol.
Juan Gato: I really don't think it'll take much of a hit because of the name brand is still too strong. The New York Times will take a turn in the piranha tank, but my gut says not that much else.
N.Z. Bear: They aren't going away, of course, but the whole 'paper of record' thing is becoming more of a punchline than a promise.
Susanna Cornett: Well, I think the systemic nature of the problem, as its been revealed and continues to unravel cuts at the heart of the NY Times' credibility. Again, it's a matter of 'in trouble among whom?' If it's the average reader, maybe not, but we all know there is an "influence elite" and I think they took a fairly good hit there.
Eugene Volokh: Susanna's point may well be correct, and I hope it is. But, I wonder whether the "influence elite" may be more blase about this. We're essentially making a prediction of how much people will care and remember about this in, say, two years. That's very hard to figure out. People might care and remember, or they might not. It would be interesting to hear what historians of the media have to say about this issue. There must have been similar scandals in the past. Have the media outlets been able to recover from them?
Susanna Cornett: Well, I think people still remember Janet Cook at the Washington Post.
Eugene Volokh: And Janet Cook is a great example -- now that you mention it, I vaguely remember her; but did the Post really suffer with its readers as a result?
N.Z. Bear: To Eugene's point, I think one of the factors that may let the Times slip by is that there is no credible alternative. WaPo refuses to go national. USA Today is argued by some to be getting genuinely good in some areas, but certainly it doesn't have the Times-reading-elite.
Eugene Volokh: N.Z.'s point about the lack of a credible alternative is pretty good.
John Hawkins: But there are lots of credible alternatives. There are 50 news sources out there that do as good a job as the New York Times.
Juan Gato: It depends a lot on if people are reading the NY Times exclusively for the information, or because they want to be known as the type of person who reads the New York Times.
N.Z. Bear: To clarify, John: Credible national, daily newspapers. You, I , and probably everyone who will read this are fine getting our news from blogs and other net sources, but the vast majority of folks still seem to want to stare at a talking head or hold dead trees in their hands.
Eugene Volokh: My main non-Internet news source is All Things Considered. Are they biased? Sure. But they're much more pleasant to listen to -- fewer commercials and more intelligence -- than any of the other radio news show.
N.Z. Bear: I'm a ATC fan as well, Eugene, for the same reasons. I'm a NPR junkie period, actually. Not because I think they are unbiased, but because there just isn't any other news-and-opinion focused product out there. (Particularly if you limit it to internet-streamable radio, which is how I do most of my listening).
Susanna Cornett: I don't think bias is so much a problem; it's bias that is vociferously defended as neutrality.
Eugene Volokh: I think bias is a problem, but I'm actually more worried about inaccuracy -- and not just large-scale Blair inaccuracy or politicized Dowd inaccuracy, but everyday, pervasive stuff: Reporters writing about things that they don't know about; calling experts just because they're on the reporters' Rolodexes, and not because they're the best ones for the job; misquoting those experts because they never check quotes; quoting people out of context because that makes for a jazzier, more controversial seeming piece. That's a huge problem, and one that troubles me more than the bias. At least readers can notice the bias and take it with a grain of salt. If a reporter misquotes someone, or makes a basic factual error, readers may be unable to tell that that's happened.
Susanna Cornett: Eugene hits on something I think is very important - the extent to which a reporter shapes a story based on what he thinks of something going in so that has an impact on who he interviews, what information he uses one of the bad aspects about using stringers - even if they are credited - is that in assigning them what to do, the reporter is making assumptions that narrow his field of inquiry and he isn't there to pursue new avenues or even recognize them. Links would be nice, a la a blog.
Eugene Volokh: I wish newspapers made a practice of providing citations for their factual assertions and the transcripts of many interviews -- on their Web sites. I know it's tough to do when the paper is on deadline, but the cites could be filled in after the piece is filed. And the knowledge that someone could check can keep reporters honest.
N.Z. Bear: Heh. The academic in Eugene rears its head!
Susanna Cornett: I think that's the best answer - transparency.
John Hawkins: It's rare that the papers link online at all. I've been mentioned in a half dozen newspaper articles and I have yet to ever get an actual link. So how much influence is the blogosphere is having on the mainstream media these days?
N.Z. Bear: Ah, the big question! Before Eugene says it, I will: it's hard to measure.
Juan Gato: Personally, I only think those blogs that are already run by media or academic personalities have the real influence.
Susanna Cornett: Well, I think we've cowed them and are now in power...
Eugene Volokh: I have no idea, and if I did claim that we had power, I'd see no reason for readers to trust me.
Susanna Cornett: In other words, Eugene, you'd be a NY Times reporter?
Eugene Volokh: Indeed!
N.Z. Bear: Hey, who invited Glenn?
John Hawkins: I can think of a few stories that bubbled up out of the blogosphere and made a big impact, the Lott comments & the Cynthia McKinney campaign donors issue come to mind. But just a few...
Eugene Volokh: Here's a guess: Journalists who read blogs are influenced by those blogs, both because they're persuaded by some of what they read, and because they don't like reading criticism of themselves.
Susanna Cornett: It's that "opinion elite" again. The extent the blogosphere has impact is based on who reads it in the big media.
Eugene Volokh: As usual in the conversation, Susanna and I are seeing eye-to-eye here.
John Hawkins: My guess is that other than the biggest blogs -- Instapundit & Sullivan, most bloggers don't have that kind of reach yet.
N.Z. Bear: That's true, John, but the magic of the blogosphere is that the good stuff --- in theory --- filters upward.
Susanna Cornett: As journalists become more blog-savvy that will change though.
N.Z. Bear: I look at my own blog, for instance, and I know that I'm nowhere near Instapundit in the level of traffic. But, I know I'm well-known enough that if I produce something particularly good and worth reading, it will get noticed and probably end up on the top blogger's pages. It's almost an ideal situation, really: day-to-day crap doesn't get huge views, but the good stuff does.
Susanna Cornett: Well, there's no Associated Press of blogs other than Glenn so the little blogs don't have the same reach as little newspapers. I think things like Daypop will assume more influence.
Eugene Volokh: Susanna is absolutely right -- and there are only so many hours even in Glenn's day.
Juan Gato: Most blogs run by what I'll call a nobody (like me) are discovered purely by happenstance. You almost have to have a name (media or academic) to get notice out of the blocks.
John Hawkins: N.Z., you're in a better position than most to see the growth of the blogosphere. Is it still growing at a rapid pace?
N.Z. Bear: I actually doubt I have much more visibility than anybody else. My Ecosystem doesn't try to automatically find new blogs, so my 2,500 is by no means representative. But there are plenty of others that do, and I've never seen a single one with more than around 130,000 listed. So where are the other 2.7 million? Are they hiding?
Juan Gato: A large part of the blogosphere stuff is from I think a year or more ago when a lot of people felt they were in a movement of some sort.
John Hawkins: Yeah but N.Z., most of the blogs out there aren't political. We're just on flavor of blogs and most of that number is just created and posted on once every blue moon.
N.Z. Bear: True, John, but many of the other ranking/cataloging tools aren't focused on politiblogs; they claim to be on everything.
John Hawkins: Yeah, but you have to figure 95% of the blogs are completely anonymous. Joe Smith starts a blog, does a handful of posts, never updates it, etc. That's the bulk of the number.
N.Z. Bear: But overall, I think we're touching on a problem near-and-dear to my heart: how to make it easier for weblog-readers to find quality blogs. I think there can be technological solutions that help address this issue, but nothing will be a silver bullet. There will always be a lot of randomness and synchronicity involved in finding one's daily reads.
John Hawkins: I think they sort themselves out over time N.Z.. If the writing is good, they work to promote their blog, and they STAY IN THE GAME LONG ENOUGH, they'll get noticed.
Juan Gato: Hasn't the most powerful blog-finding tool to this point been the referral log?
Susanna Cornett: The referral log can be an excellent tool, it has been for me.
John Hawkins: It is for me as well Juan. You'd be surprised how many of my 'websites of the day' came to my attention the first time by sending me traffic.
N.Z. Bear: (Note to self: Link John more often...)
Juan Gato: But the referral log also enforces the 'like-minded' blog reading since generally one is linked by someone of similar thought.
John Hawkins: So what do we see as the future of the blogosphere? Will the big bloggers be snapped up by the mainstream media? Will the big boys start to rival major newspapers? What do you think?
Eugene Volokh: I think the really big boys have already started to rival major columnists, and major political magazine editors. (Glenn is really the equivalent of an editor for a political magazine, in many ways.)
Susanna Cornett: Blogs are to an extent a cult of personality, and that tends to draw a fairly loyal and persistent audience.
N.Z. Bear: The important distinction to make is between columnist/pundits and journalists/reporters. Blogs can be both, but most of the time, we're talking about blogs as columnists/pundits. And I think that over time, the line between 'real media' pundits and blog pundits will continue to blur, as it has begun to do already. For journalists/reporters, it will never be quite the same. Although we will continue to see specific stories which get driven by bloggers doing real reporting, or at least, on-the-scene commentary simply by the fact that they happen to be in the right place at the right time. (Prime example: Salam Pax)
John Hawkins: Yeah, but are there going to be 40 blogs with the power of Andrew Sullivan's Daily Dish and Instapundit one day?
Juan Gato: Will we reach a point where there will be a self-refilling supply of pundits willing to be pundits for free, though?
Susanna Cornett: The big issue is going to be the ability of a blog pundit to keep up quality work in the face of having a day job for a long time.
John Hawkins: Will the blogosphere ever get big enough where people can give up their day jobs?
Eugene Volokh: I wonder whether it might be helpful to reframe this from the macro perspective: How many people might read Web logs, once they hear more about them and find some that they like? If the answer to the second question is, say, 20 million, then it's a fair bet that there'll be quite a few blogs with 50,000+ readers. But if the answer to the second question is, say, 2 million, then there won't be that many.
Susanna Cornett: I think the model for blog pundits will divide more, into the Lileks model and Reynolds model. One long post a day vs a bunch of smaller linky posts with the longer commentary making it into the paid media. I do think blog pundits will begin to concentrate more in the professions that support outside activities.
Eugene Volokh: Folks, it's been a lot of fun, but I have to leave for dinner with my lovely wife and some friends in 15 minutes, and I have to get dressed. John, thanks very much for the invitation; everyone, great talking to you; hope to e-talk to you again soon using one cybermedium or another.
N.Z. Bear: Wonders if this means Eugene has done this entire session naked?
Eugene Volokh: Wouldn't you like to know, N.Z.?
Susanna Cornett: Have fun, Eugene - it was a pleasure.
N.Z. Bear: Pleasure to chat virtually with you, Eugene!
John Hawkins: Have a good one Eugene.
Juan Gato: Have a good evening.
John Hawkins: So do you see a lot of bloggers making enough money to go full time in the next couple of years?
Susanna Cornett: Not without a concentrated focus like Sullivan's, John. Sullivan actively solicits his readers for support.
John Hawkins: That's not a bad idea =D.
Susanna Cornett: Lol.
N.Z. Bear: As for money: no, no way. The very success of the blogosphere, and the fact that so many people are willing to do it for the pleasure of it, virtually guarantees that there's not going to be a paid market for blogging. Or rather, there *is* a market, but it is very much a buyer's market.
Susanna Cornett: I don't think any bloggers will be able to make a super living just blogging not to support a family, get a retirement, pay insurance. What they may do is leverage a career through their blog....
John Hawkins: I look at this like professional wrestling. Plenty of people springboard into movies and TV from pro-wrestling, but the ones who quit wrestling then no longer have a fan base big enough make them worth using. Same deal with blogging -- it may lead to books, columns, & money down the road -- but only if that base is there.
N.Z. Bear: I plan to springboard into professional wrestling from blogging.
Susanna Cornett: I'm looking for an academic position right now, and I'm a little concerned that my blog will be discovered and my conservative views used in the decision making process (obviously not concerned enough to stop blogging, though).
John Hawkins: Susanna, just lie and tell them you run Atrios' blog -- they'll love you.
Susanna Cornett: LOL John.
John Hawkins: Well...is there anything else you'd like to cover?
Susanna Cornett: I want to discuss whether Glenn uses stringers and doesn't give them credit.
N.Z. Bear: Heh. Indeed.
John Hawkins: I heard a rumor that if you mention his name three times, he appears like the Candyman and links your blog -- let's try it...Glenn Reynolds, Glenn Reynolds, Glenn Reynolds.
Susanna Cornett: (Posing as Glenn) Hello! You're all on my front page now!
John Hawkins: That's the dream -- to be at the top of Glenn's page as he goes on a two week long vacation.
Susanna Cornett: I think the biggest impact the blogosphere may have on big media IS in the area of transparency. Fact checking their *sses' as the saying goes. We won't necessarily rival them often in covering a story, but we CAN and do worry them like a terrier if they get something wrong or if their spin is particularly egregious.
John Hawkins: And that has made an impact I think....Well gentlemen, ladies, it has been a blast this will be up on RWN tomorrow after I edit the Hell out of it.
Susanna Cornett: Uh oh, won't that take out the best parts?
John Hawkins: I'm just going to include my comments and edit all of your answers to 'I agree John'!
Susanna Cornett: LOL. You know, I tried to copy this conversation and it wouldn't let me. So much for transparency, JOHN!
John Hawkins: I'm doing it all from memory.
Susanna Cornett: Then maybe it was user incompetence. It wouldn't be the first time.
Juan Gato: I'm sure Homeland Security has a copy. Just file a Freedom of Info request, and we'll have a transcript in 2017.
John Hawkins: Thanks everybody! This will be up tomorrow.
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