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March 17, 2004

At the Jersey blog MeetUp
: I'm at the NJ.com blog meetup and here's a link to one of the bloggers, a town father of South Orange who blogs on NJ.com. Another local blogger who uses his for biz. Tom of TheMediaDrop is here, talking about redoing his house. More later.
Tom told the story of being dropped from the PR Newswire's journalist section because he couldn't give them a clip from a publication showing he's a journalist. What incredibly numbnutty flacks they are! Don't they get that this is the future of journalism? Don't they get that they should be grateful that anybody is ever paying attention to their grating press releases? Jeesh.
And then Debra Gallant, the charming writer for The New York Times -- and blogger -- dropped in. Various of us had talked to her about a story she's writing for The Times on Jersey bloggers and it was a real pleasure to meet in person. She said she'd just donated blogging lessons to her temple's fundraiser; I like that idea.
I should also plug our hosts: South Orange blogger Tracy Randinelli; Jersey blogger John Shabe; and NJ.com Editor-in-chief Dean Betz.

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A year later
: Today is the one-year anniversary of the amazing, wonderful, useful, groundbreaking, news-business-changing Command Post... but cofounder Michele is not celebrating. She's fretting:

Everybody loves an anniversary, terrorists included. Numbers, symbolism, special dates - conspiracy theorists have a field day with that stuff. But it's not always theory, is it?
Now that we know al-Qaeda is seeking revenge for America and its allies participation in the de-throning of Saddam, I have to wonder if that merry band of murderers has something up their collective sleeves.

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The Daily Stern: PM edition

: F KCRW: Sandra Tsing Loh, fired KCRW commentator and fellow traveler with Howard Stern and Bubba the Love Sponge, writes her story for Time and concludes:

I’ve seen the future and it is John Tesh. . . music. Pre-recorded.

: UNCONSTITUTIONAL, SAYS AFTRA: Show biz union AFTRA has struck out against the indecent indecency bills rushing through Congress:

The American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (AFTRA) has challenged Congress' attempt to place heavy fines for indecency on broadcasters and on-air artists, calling the proposed legislation "unconstitutional."
John Connolly, AFTRA's national president, and Greg Hessinger, the union's national executive director, on Tuesday faxed letters to all 100 members of the U.S. Senate questioning the legality of S. 2056, the proposed Broadcast Decency Enforcement Act....
Connolly and Hessinger said the senators should reject the legislation because "it represents an unconstitutional threat to the First Amendment and would have an immediate and significant chilling effect on artistic freedom...."

: My friend and colleage Joe Territo also sides with Howard and is dubious about the new liberal radio network: "But I don't see myself ever listening to Franken radio, unless he can put a liberal spin on lesbian dial-a-date."

: UPDATE: Sen. Sam Brownback of Kansas told Mel Karmazin to get rid of Howard Stern and didn't like Karmazin's reply defending Stern. Story here. Some interesting background on Brownback here:

Six members of Congress live in a million-dollar Capitol Hill townhouse that is subsidized by a secretive religious organization, tax records show.
The lawmakers, all of whom are Christian, pay low rent to live in the stately red brick, three-story house on C Street, two blocks from the Capitol. It is maintained by a group, alternately known as the ''Fellowship'' and the ''Foundation,'' that brings together world leaders and elected officials through religion.
The Fellowship is host of receptions, luncheons and prayer meetings on the first two floors of the house, which is registered with the IRS as a church. The six lawmakers — U.S. Reps. Zach Wamp, R-Chattanooga; Bart Stupak, D-Mich.; Jim DeMint, R-S.C.; and Mike Doyle, D-Pa.; and U.S. Sens. John Ensign, R-Nev.; and Sam Brownback, R-Kan. — live in private rooms upstairs.
Rent is $600 a month, DeMint said....
Its tenants dine together once a week to discuss religion in their daily lives.

A very special interest.

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What a twit
: I was already glad that Howard Dean lost. But, you know, the guy manages to remind me of how glad I am:

Former Democratic presidential candidate Howard Dean said yesterday that President Bush's decision to send troops to Iraq appears to have contributed to the bombing deaths of 201 people in Spain....
Dean referred to the videotape when asked whether he was linking US troops in Iraq to the deaths in Spain.
"That was what they said in the tape," Dean said. "They made that connection, I'm simply repeating it."
Dean made the remarks during a conference call with reporters as he was defending his former rival John F. Kerry, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, from a Bush campaign ad. The ad accused Kerry of turning his back on US soldiers fighting in Iraq.
Dean said it is the president who has not supported the troops. He said Bush sent soldiers to Iraq unequipped, misled the country on the reasons for war, and made the United States less safe by focusing on a target that wasn't a threat.
And, he said, "The president was the one who dragged our troops to Iraq, which apparently has been a factor in the death of 200 Spaniards over the weekend."
Dean issued a statement later to The Associated Press that said, "Let me be clear, there is no justification for terrorism. Today I was simply repeating what those who have claimed responsibility for the bombings in Spain said was the reason they carried out that despicable act."

And they also say we are the devil; should you repeat that?
This man was never the stuff of the presidency. Thank goodness the voters are so smart.

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AOsmell
: John Battelle tells Time Warner to spin off AOL already.
And while we're telling them what to do I just want to make sure -- as a long-suffering shareholder -- that they won't allow one single expense-account meal at the $300-$500-per-head (plus drinks, tax tip) restaurant in their expensive new HQ. Not one, boys.

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Writing for your audience... or not

: A commentor below raised a cosmic weblog issue when he (or is it she?) asked whether I know who my audience is.

That was said in exasperation at my daily Stern reports and so I'll deal with that before I rise to the cosmic question. The commenter's implication, of course, is that my audience doesn't like Stern or what I'm saying about him -- and issues of free speech -- and is upset that I haven't changed my mind to agree with them. And so I should just cease and desist. But I won't. I've liked Stern for years. I am an absolutist in regards to free speech and the Constitution's prohibition of government control of speech. And I am appalled and frightened by the orgy of Talibanism coming out of Congress and the government now. I believe this is a critically important issue. And, in fact, many of my readers agree (I've been getting a lot of supportive links and email). So, to answer your question: No, I'm not going to shut up about Stern. If you don't like him, change the station. If you don't like my posts about him, scroll. If you don't like me, click away. I'm staying on the Stern story.

But the question this raises is really bigger than just Howard Stern and so and I'll rephrase it:

Should webloggers adjust what they say based on what their audiences want?

Or: What is the proper relationship of webloggers to their publics?

Now if you are trying to cover a subject, that's fairly obvious: Marketing Wonk covers marketing; LostRemote covers TV; Corante's Many2Many covers social software. That is their compact with their publics: You know what you're going to get when you click there.

But personal weblogs are different, no? My weblog is a representation of me and my thinking. It is my avatar. I am, therefore I blog; I blog, therefore I am.

In discussion about getting advertising on weblogs, the fear that is often raised (it was raised in my comments just the other day) is that bloggers will bend to the will of advertisers -- or even just to the fear of what those advertisers would dislike -- and that would rob them of their credibility, their honesty.

So if I change what I am saying to bend to the will of the public, my public, am I being false? If I see that something gets traffic and I do more of it to get more traffic, am I whoring myself for links? If I change my mind about an issue -- say, Stern and free speech -- to ingratiate myself to my public and not drive them away, am I living a lie?

It's often said that a mark of art is that artists create art for themselves, not their publics.

Stop: Step away from that mouse. Don't click on the "comment" link yet. I am not saying that blogs are art.

But I am saying that making this personal makes a difference. That defines the mission. If you go to PaidContent, you get paid content. If you go to Buzzmachine, you get Jarvis. Love him or leave him, you get Jarvis. That is my mission and the compact I make with my public: I am WYSIWYG.

In fact, that is one of the first lessons I learned doing a blog (see the post below for another): I had to be as open as I was honest. And that meant I started saying things publicly that violated my training as a journalist. I spent much of my life hiding my own opinions. But here, in this two-way medium, I learned that I had to be transparent (or, to really mess up this metaphor, my audience would be able to see through my attempt not to be). I had to give you some context for my perspective and my history. My personal experience on 9/11 had life-changing impact on my views of war and politics and so I had to be reveal that.

And the net result of all this is that I learned not to be frightened of transparency (see, again, that post below). In fact, I came to embrace transparency and believe that in this new media world of relationships transparency becomes necessary to build credibility and show trust and -- most of all -- show respect.

And so, in the end, if you like me and what I say and how I say it -- or like arguing with me or like interacting with the public I attract -- wonderful. If you don't, well, there's not much I can do about it. This is the only me I've got.

So, no, I can't shift what I think and thus say for an audience anymore than I can for an advertiser (or the government). Bloggers have to be true to themselves or they live a lie -- no, they blog a lie.

LINK | Comments (21)

Transparency

: I was digging into the State of the News Media report, already much-linked, and found this nugget about the relationship of news media to its public:

The problem is a disconnection between the public and the news media over motive. Journalists believe they are working in the public interest and are trying to be fair and independent in that cause. This is their sense of professionalism.
The public thinks these journalists are either lying or deluding themselves. The public believes that news organizations are operating largely to make money and that the journalists who work for these organizations are primarily motivated by professional ambition and self-interest.

I believe that if you took some of that "public" and sat them down in a bar with some of those from "news media," they'd all in all end up liking ... or perhaps respecting ... or at least not disdaining ... and maybe better understanding each other. The problem is that there is a separation between the "news media" and its "public."

That is perhaps the greatest lesson I have learned in weblogs; it was the first lesson I writing this blog: I had a new relationship with my "public." (And I'll quit the obnoxious quote marks now.)

The public spoke; it argued; it agreed; it disagreed; it could be friendly; it could be generous; it could be trollish; it had names. But I now had a relationship with my public I'd never had before. And that public had a relationship with me it never could have before, when I was merely printed on paper: a two-way relationship.

You think I'm going to say that blogs are going to solve all this and if everybody just had a blog (or sat in a bar together) we'd all get along.

Fooled ya. No, I'm just arguing the virtues of transparency. At Bloggercon last year, the audience demanded -- or at least suggested strongly -- transparency from Len Apcar and the New York Times; but Apcar, as I remember, was openly skittish about the idea of sharing the process of news. At that time, that seemed at least reasonable; why have people fight with you over what you almost did when they'are already fighting with you over what you did?

But when you are not transparent, people will assume their definition of the worst. If you are transparent, you show the effort you put behind trying to serve them and you also give them the respect to include them in the process. That is a moral of weblogs. It's a moral the news business needs to figure out.

: UPDATE: As Hypergene says, transparency is also served when news sources get blogs and tell their sides of stories directly. Witness Mark Cuban's blog, on which he answers newspaper writers.

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Mr. Blog goes to Washington
: So it appears Ed Cone is seriously considering running for Congress. Frankly, I thought it was just one of those blog moments but he's weighing the pros and cons. He'd be good. I fear he's too nice and too decent, but we could use more of that.

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Jersey bloggers: Come one, come all
: NJ.com's Jersey blogger MeetUp is tonight in South Orange. Come all.

LINK | Comments (3)

Peanut gallery
: Ross Mayfield is putting up SocialText eventspace for PC Forum and it's open to all of us. You don't have to pay the admission fee (but you also don't get the nice Arizona weather) and still join in.
During the Mediamorphisis confab, I quite enjoyed joining in from the peanut gallery, on their blog and mine (seeing whether I could start a meme or get mentioned there). PC Forum is the big time.

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The Daily Stern

: THE TODAY SHOW'S MADE-UP NEWS: Saw the most ludicrous segment on The Today Show this morning, arguing that America is turning wholesome. It was so made up. The evidence: Right-wing bore Michael Medved says people are into religion (that's a new view) and Jay Leno beats David Letterman (and where does Leno air?). Stern airs the segment later and says, "Why don't they point out I beat all my competitors."
After the say-nothing "report," adman Donny Deutsch stands up for free speech against right-wing blatherer Peggy Noonan.
No story. No reporting. No evidence. No point.
Unjournalism.

ON THE RIGHT SIDE: Here's a story on the representatives who voted against the House's indecent indecency bill.

...for Rep. John Lewis (D-Ga.) the issue created barely a ripple.
"I go all over this city and all over this district. ... No one, but no one, asked me one thing about it. No one said one word," Lewis said Friday, a day after voting against a bill to greatly boost fines for indecent programming ...

: ONE MAN'S INDECENCY: A Kansas senator wrote to Viacom head Mel Karmazin telling him to take Stern off the air and Karmazin replied regarding the show that caused Clear Channel to pull Stern: "Our editors made the good faith judgment that the references which aired were not graphic, patently offensive descriptions of sexual activity."

: IT'S NOT ABOUT HOWARD; IT'S ABOUT US: I forgot to mention this from Howard's show yesterday but it's a good thing, because Tony Pierce did a fear better job reporting and analyzing it than I could have:

howard stern was right this morning. rolling stone wants to put him on their cover and write about his problems with the fcc and at first he was going to do it, but then he realized that this wasnt His problem, it's Everyones problem. for 20 years hes been doing his show and the public has been eating it up.

nothing that he does is obscene. it's about sex a lot of the times, but that doesnt instantly make it obscene.

the radio waves are the public's airwaves. how public is it when one company owns 80% of it? how public is it when a few republicans are dictating what can be broadcast? how public is it when the number one broadcaster is suddenly deemed obscene the same month he comes out against the president of the united states?

i know a lot of my elected officials read this.

and some officials, like senator clinton read this too.

if you fools dont start fighting the repubs on this issue and on the issue of free speech and of the issue of censorship and of the issue of assholes bulldozing their quote unquote morals all over my shit im going to not only vote them out but vote you out too.

where is the main democratic voice standing up and saying, oh no you didn't!

do i have to elect the audience of the jerry springer show to run my senate?

Bravo, Tony.

: INCONSISTENT: Greg Ross from GoKart records sends an eloquent defense of Stern and attack on Clear Channel to the German site Ox:

But the standard Clear Channels applies to radio does not appear to apply to some of its other lucrative businesses, like the concert venues it owns all over the country. This summer, performers like Blink-182, the Ozzfest with Ozzy Osbourne, Britney Spears, Ludacris, and Slayer will be performing at numerous Clear Channel-owned concert venues.
Before I continue, let me clarify, no criticism of the performers above is intended; rather I wish to draw attention to the hypocrisy of Clear Channel’s recent decision.
Blink-182, a band who has a very young teen fan base, has been to known to perform naked onstage and sing songs with lyrics such as “It's Christmas eve and I've only wrapped two f****** presents - And I hate, hate, hate your guts - I hate, hate, hate your guts - And I'll never talk to you again - unless your dad will **** me ***...

And on and on with many a bleepable example.
Clear Channel has painted itself into a moral corner.
It now says it has a zero tolerance policy toward "indecency" and its "local" standards. So if Bubba is fired from its stations because he was fined, why wasn't Elliott in the Morning? If Elliott was fined and fired, why did they drop Stern when he wasn't fined? If Bubba's and Howard's words -- mild, mild words in comparison to this Ox post -- then shouldn't Clear Channel enforce local standards and muzzle and bleep and fire most of its very lucrative concert stars? If Clear Channel and its communities are offended in one incidence, aren't they in all? If this is about Clear Channel's decision -- and not Congress' and the White House's -- wouldn't Clear Channel enforce its new zero tolerance policy consistently? Wouldn't Clear Channel go out of the music business? Huh?

: THE ABC STORY: Here's a story based on a supportive Good Morning America report on Stern.

: REQUIRED READING: HowardStern.com is now updating its required reading daily. Oh, how they need a blog.

: PREVIOUS DAILY STERN POSTS: here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here.

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