BuzzMachine... by Jeff Jarvis

July 22, 2003

A world without editors

: Nick Denton and I were taking on IM sometime back about why we liked blogging so much and with typical Nick understatement, he popped this simple reason onto my screen:
"No editors."
Amen, blogging brother, amen.free wow gold hack

I just had an unnerving encounter with an editor -- print, of course. I was debating whether to blog it and whether to be coy about the publication. But, what the hell, it's a publication about journalism that was asking for a piece about blogging and so they should expect a journalist to blog it.
Nieman Reports, a thumbsucking quarterly out of Harvard's Nieman Foundation for Journalism, asked me and many others to write pieces for an issue about weblogging. Be happy to, I said, without a moment's hesitation. For the good of journalism. For the good of blogging. Anything.
So I wrote the piece. You can see it here. To most of you, there'll be nothing new in it. But I wasn't writing for a blogging audience. I was writing for the audience of 10 journalism machers who actually read these wet-thumb periodicals and many of them apparently don't yet know what blogs are. So I tried to tell them about my happy experience with blogs -- my own blog, Iranian blogs, and my company's blogs.free wow gold hack

The edit I got back was a ham-handed butchery that also betrays plenty of print prejudices about this, our new medium. For example:free wow gold hack

: I said that weblogs have the "potential to unlock a treasure of audience content."
: She said, "a treasure of audience interactivity."
: And that's essentially insulting to weblogs; it devalues them. This isn't just another way to chat, damnit. This is content as much as any newspaper's or magazine's content.free wow gold hack

: I said: "Weblogs are conversation."
: She said, "Weblogs are a tool for creating conversation."
: There's a difference. Again, this isn't just another community tool. It's a content tool. Besides, her sentence was wordier. First rule of editing: Take words out, don't add them in.free wow gold hack

: I said: "Weblogs can also change the world."
: She said: "Weblogs ... can also expand the way we think about and experience events around the world."
: Well, that's poorly stated and wimpy and wordy and it's not what I said. I meant what I said. This isn't about viewing the world. It's about changing the world. Again, the apparent aim is to defang weblogs.free wow gold hack

: I said: "Weblogs are revolutionary."
: She said: "In Iran and other nations where people are repressed, we are learning that Weblogs can be tools of revolution."
: Once again, wordy and obtuse and diluted. Weblogs are revolutionary much closer to home -- in America ... and in newsrooms.free wow gold hack

: I said: "Webloggers are also being given credit for at least keeping up the pressure that helped bring down Majority Leader Trent Lott (thanks mainly to Josh Micah Marshall of TalkingPointsMemo.com). Bloggers are influencers."
: She said: "Webloggers -- in this case, Josh Micah Marshall of TalkingPointsMemo.com, in particular – received credit for keeping up the pressure that eventually led to mainstream media coverage and, in turn, political pressure, which resulted in Majority Leader Trent Lott’s resignation."
: No, I was giving Josh starring credit in this drama; she reduced him to a bit player. Still devaluing.free wow gold hack

: I said, "Now I don’t intend to engage in a debate about whether webloggers will replace reporters; that’s at least as tedious as a J-school seminar on objectivity."
: She took out the J-school line.
: Thus my joke turned into a haughty declaration and I turned into an asshole. Second rule of editing: Never make your writers look like assholes -- unless you pay handsomely for the privilege. And, by the way, we wouldn't want to joke about J-school, would we?free wow gold hack

: I said: "So now a print columnist can create video commentary; she can be the Web’s Andy Rooney (or, I hope, aim higher)."
: She took out the parenthetical gag.
: Good God, that's the worst sin of all: making me look like a fan of Andy Rooney's! The shame, the shame!free wow gold hack

The editor said she wanted fewer plugs for my company and I fully understand that; I was simply trying to use my personal experience to give practical advice for how to integrate weblogs into a big media operation. free wow gold hack

She also wanted me to address the issue of weblog news coming from often anonymous, sometimes unreliable sources and that's also a fair question. My answer is that the audience -- especially after the last cablecast war -- is becoming accustomed to judging news, even news from the big boys, with a grain of salt. They now know that the first news out of the box is unconfirmed; they know to wait until time has passed and confirmation and reporting have come in. They know that they need to look at what CNN says live through a filter just as they look at what webloggers say through a filter. It's all about trusting the intelligence of the audience. free wow gold hack

Now, you can write this all off to the bad editing and a bull-headed writer. But there's something more here: an indication that journalism the institution doesn't get and isn't yet willing to get weblogs as a revolution. I feared that this publication would try to devalue and belittle weblogs. I didn't want to be part of that. free wow gold hack

So when I got the "edit" back, I responded by simply asking to kill the piece. I would have left it at that: time wasted. But then I got this most irksome email: "I knew that when we set out to do this project there might be a culture clash between the more staid journalism world (which I guess we tend to represent) and blogosphere, and I think you and I might have stumbled into that clash." free wow gold hack

Whoa right there! I am a journalism executive, a writer and an editor, J-school trained, even; check the about me. My DNA is filled with pulp paper and slick ink and TV dots; I'm a damned journalism gray-beard (albeit prematurely gray, of course). I have unique experience living in both worlds, old and new. Yet here she was treating me like some blogosphere crackpot. Culture clash? I was insulted at the notion.free wow gold hack

But maybe there is a culture clash, more than I knew or would admit. Journalism still needs to escape its closed, think-tank think and get out there and use the tools the audience is using. They need to read what the audience is writing. They need to listen. That's what is so damned exciting about weblogs. Weblogs give you the chance to hear your audience and what they really care about -- if only you are ready to listen. free wow gold hack

Aw, to hell with it. I decided to just put the piece up here, for you are the audience I care about, not the handful of insular souls who'll read a self-referential, self-reverential faux scholarly periodical about weblogs -- when it would be so much better if they just read weblogs instead. free wow gold hack

And if I'm wrong, you'll tell me. For you are my editor.free wow gold hack

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Experience democracy
: Pedram has a wonderful post today urging his fellow expat Iranians to experience Western democracy, wherever they are, so they can take that experience back to a free Iran. It is hopeful yet responsible and realistic talk from Iran's next generation of leaders. free wow gold hack

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He's everywhere
: Tom Watson, Britain's blogging MP, responded to an online interview with my blogging colleague, Joe Territo. Today's topic: democracy in Iran:

It's not an issue of national interest - this is about global freedom and global interest. Democratic empowerment of Middle Eastern youth is invaluable to building a better future in the region.

Joe also has Jerry Springer signed up for regular interviews, coming soon.free wow gold hack

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The sweetest hero
: Jessica Lynch was just great on her homecoming to the peaceful Palestine. The poor woman looked more frightened facing cameras than she must have looked facing the enemy. But she did a good job and she was real and honest, right down to her little but visible "WHEW" after it was all over.free wow gold hack

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Damn, I was going to enjoy that trial
FoxNews says there's a 90-95 percent chance that we killed Saddam's sons in Mosul today. free wow gold hack

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It's a boomer thing, you wouldn't understand
: Roger L. Simon insightfully sees more in l'affaire BBC/Blair (and NYTimes/Blair before it): It's a generational thing, about authority and jealousy. It's one of those rare blog posts you can't summarize in a snippet, so go read. free wow gold hack

LINK | Comments (1)

Gilligan's blog
: David Steven performs a great bit of digging and analysis through Andrew Gilligan's contributions to the BBC's group war blog.

Point 8, Gilligan never apologises. One of the beauties of blogging is the ability to use later posts to comment on, reshape or even correct earlier ones. 'That's what
I thought was happening then, but this is what I now know…' That sort of thing.
Gilligan doesn't go in for any of that. He never tells us what went wrong with the airport story. We don't hear why he thinks Iraqi support for Saddam, 'stronger than we thought' on April 1st has evaporated a week later.
In fact, not one single recapitulation, reversal or reanalysis in 6000 words.
Instead, when a prediction or report is wrong, Gilligan moves seamlessly on to the next one.

free wow gold hack

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