Blogging and journalism

Dan Forbush of ProfNet moderated a panel on "Blogging and Journalism" on Day 2 of the New Communications Forum. Panelists included SiliconValleyWatcher Tom Foremski, late of the Financial Times, "the first journalist to resign from his job at one of the world's leading newspapers to become a full-time professional blogger;" Heath Row, editorial and community director of FastCompany.com; and Jeremy Wright, "blogpreneur" and consultant famed for auctioning himself on eBay.

(Elizabeth and Jen, this was a great panel, but I'm compelled to ask: Was there no female blogger/journalist, or a reasonable facsimile thereof, available to join these distinguished gents?)

Notes from the discussion:

- Tom Foremski started SiliconValleyWatcher last September never having blogged before and is now just "figuring out what can be done." He "loves all the different writing styles and forms blogging enables" and doesn't miss the constraints of the old print model -- such as specified article lengths and styles -- it leaves by the wayside.

Tom made an instant fan of me by citing with gentle but unmistakeable disdain a USA Today article downplaying the significance of the blogging phenomenon. ("Chill, blogophiles," indeed!). His intial commandment for bloggers: "Keep relevant, concentrate on content, and the rest will take care of itself.

- Heath's Fast Company (FC) blog was the first blog launched by a business magazine. [Note correction from original post]. (He also keeps a blog at Cardhouse.com: Heath Row's Media Diet.) Although blogging is "very uncontrolled" and therefore problematic to editors, FC has "run with it" for a number of reasons:

• Blogging is a great way for a monthly publication to meet the challenge of providing "fresh, sustainable daily content."
• Blogs provide additional service to readers by offering a venue where "not-quite-a-story ideas" can be shared.
• Bloggging fulfills an FC mission by offering readers ways to connect with people in the magazine's pages and involving readers in the creation of the magazine. It's also a source of story ideas.
• Blogging lets FC "explore new forms of business journalism."
• The FC blog has "given us tremendous Google juice." Though the blog gets only one percent of the FC site's page view per day, it's always highly ranked on Google. "My name," says Heath, "appears above the airport in London." (I just checked. He's almost right.)

Heath cited several "outcomes and projects" that have emanated from the blog:

• "It used to be that print spilled over to the web. Now we're beginning to see the web spill over to print." A recent blog post on Sanctuary Records ended up as a full-page feature in the print magazine.
• Health invites authors of business books featured in FC print to be guest bloggers.
• When the blog turned one year old, members of the FC community -- including readers -- were invited to be guest contributors for two days. Forty-five people participated in the festivities.

Listening to Heath's remarks, I was tempted to reinstate my long-lapsed subscription to the magazine and to rejoin Company of Friends, FC's "global readers' network." And, in fact, I may.

- Jeremy Wright identified himself as "as far from a journalist as you can get." He bills himself as a "professional blogger and blog consultant" and his company, InsideBlogging, as "the world's foremost blog consulting company. Modest, he is not -- in fact, Jeremy struck me as the most self-promotional presenter at the conference, bar none, and, based on this panel, the one with the least to say. Though, I suppose, there is something to be said for auctioning yourself on eBay, selling your blog for $15,000, getting fired for blogging, and bragging about it all. 

- Dan Taylor asked the panel whether their move into blogging had changed their relationships with PR professionals. "Nothing has changed," said Tom. "It's still about trusted relationships. For Heath, "the threshold has changed slightly. As for Jeremy, "A year ago, I was nobody, but now I interact with PR professionals on a day-to-day basis."

- Another questioner wondered, "What's the most valuable way for a PR person to contact you?" Jeremy suggested trying to "start a conversation by saying why the information in the press release has value." For him, "personal relationship building has the greatest value."  Heath offered three "good-care practices" for working with him as a journalist: (1) "The power of the idea is key." (2) Understand what FC does. (3) Contact me by e-mail and don't call to see if I received your message. Tom said, "Sometimes it takes me a couple of days to get through my inbox," so "phone me on time-sensitive content. Give me the option to take the call and get the story."

- In answer to the question,"Why don't blogs make it into print more often?" Health replied that it's not always made explicit that a print story originated with a blog entry. "Web complement to print publications are often viewed as ghettos" -- for example, Health is the only editor for the entire FC website. Tom said much the same, albeit with a blunter sort of charm: "Journalists steal from each other all the time and don't like to admit it, so blogs don't get cited."

Health added that journalists are not honest about their biases, while "blogging honors the real subjectivity, 'intersubjectivity.'" He cited David Weinberger on the subject. Here's a Weinberger piece that, at a quick glance, looks like a good place to begin to understand the concept as it plays out in the blogosphere. Intersubjectivity involves not only "find[ing] lots of points of view," but "get[ting] to know them over time," and "see[ing]" them interrelated over 'space'" as a means of assessing trustworthiness.

Jeremy envisions three possible models for the future: (1) You read only the points of view you agree with. (2) Blogs just "become part of the fabric of the net." (3) Blogs change completely. (He didn't say how.)

-  Tom is fascinated by the technology that enables blogging and believes it will completely change the media industry. "For the [San Francisco] Chronicle to produce a column-inch of copy is very expensive, while producing good blog content is cheap. . . .If I pulled out all the "people brands' [columnists], and with reporters not allowed to express opinions, what would be left of the Chronicle?"

- Heath is a big supporter of grass-roots media but doesn't think that MSM will die. "Blogging is just a form of transmission." We still have "trusted tribal voices in the mainstream media," -- for example, The Economist has no bylines, but we are drawn by its great writing. Similarly, in higher education, people now sometimes choose universities for their "rock-star" professors, rather than the university brand.

Great discussion! Too short! This would have been a fascinating topic to share with fellow participants around our tables, right there and then.