The Wired Self III

The Wired Everyday: Blogs

Dr Tama Leaver

Communication Studies, The University of Western Australia

The Wired Self III: The Wired Everyday Weblogs

1. Blogs: origins, types and the hype.

2. Meet the bloggers.

3. Participatory culture and citizen journalism?

[I] Blogs: origins, types and the hype.

Tim Berners-Lee: www, http, browsers

hypertext A rhizome

Hypertext and Rhizomes

Rebecca Blood:The promise of the web was that everyone could publish, that a thousand voices could flourish, communicate, connect. The truth was that only those people who knew how to code a web page could make their voices heard. Blogger […] and all the rest have given people with little or no knowledge of HTML the ability to publish on the web: to pontificate, remember, dream, and argue in public, as easily as they send an instant message. We can't seriously compare the creation of the World Wide Web itself with the availability of free technology that allows anyone with a web browser to express their unique, irreproducible vision to the rest of the world...can we?

- Rebecca Blood, ‘Weblogs: A History and Perspective’, COURSE READER.

Source: http://www.sifry.com/alerts/archives/2007/04/the_state_of_th.html

Source: http://www.sifry.com/alerts/archives/000436.html

Source: http://www.sifry.com/alerts/archives/2007/04/the_state_of_th.html

http://www.rebeccablood.net/

Rebecca Blood:

We are being pummeled by a deluge of data and unless we create time and spaces in which to reflect, we will be left with only our reactions. I strongly believe in the power of weblogs to transform both writers and readers from "audience" to "public" and from "consumer" to "creator." Weblogs are no panacea for the crippling effects of a media-saturated culture, but I believe they are one antidote.

- Rebecca Blood, ‘Weblogs: A History and Perspective’, COURSE READER.

The Zits on Blogs:

Expanding Blogosphere…

• Video Blogs - Vlogs - (http://rocketboom.com)

• Podcasts (http://dailysourcecode.com)

• Moblogs/Photoblogs (http://flickr.com)

[2] Meet a Few Bloggers …

What’s in Rebecca’s Pocket?

http://www.rebeccablood.net/

Salam Pax’s Blog: http://dear_raed.blogspot.com/

Salam Pax

Jill Walker Rettberg, Blogging (2008)

http://jilltxt.net/

Coming Soon to Your Library!

Blogs on the Yahoo7 Olympics website…

Blogs on The Australian website…

[3] Citizen Journalism and Participatory Culture?

thememoryhole.org

Russ Kick’s thememoryhole.org, posted:22 Apr 2004 [one of 288 photos]

Blogging the Democratic National Convention

Blogging the Democratic National Convention II:

London Bombings (2005)

Picture: Adam Stacey (Mobile Phone)

Picture: Alexander Chadwick (Mobile Phone, sent to BBC)

Photo Source: http://ddunleavy.typepad.com/the_big_picture/2006/08/cloning_lebanon_1.html

Adnan Hajj: Reuters, Lebanon, Photoshop!

Blogs show photoshopping has occurred:

http://www.rightwinged.com/2006/08/photoshopping_the_news_reuters.html

From: Foreign Correspondent, ABC, 29/4/08

A transcript of the video played in the lecture can be read read online at:

http://www.abc.net.au/foreign/content/2008/s2225682.htm

A Few Good … Citizen Journalism Blogs:

• The Daily Kos: http://www.dailykos.com/ (US, Centre Left)

“Markos Moulitsas -- a.k.a. "kos" -- created Daily Kos on May 26, 2002, in those dark days when an oppressive and war-crazed administration suppressed all dissent as unpatriotic and treasonous. As a veteran, Moulitsas was offended that the freedoms he pledged his life for were so carelessly being tossed aside by the reckless and destructive Republican administration.”

• Larvatus Prodeo: http://larvatusprodeo.net/ (Old Left Style, Australia Politics)

But are bloggers journalists?

(Or do we need to ask a better question?)

1. Mainstream, top-down, professional journalism will continue to play a vital role in covering news events, and in shaping our interpretation of those events, as it should.

2. Bloggers will grow increasingly adept at covering certain kinds of news events, but not all. They will play an increasingly important role in the interpretation of all kinds of news.

3. The majority of bloggers won't be concerned with traditional news at all.

Steven Johnson

Steven Johnson4. Professional, edited journalism will have a much

higher signal-to-noise ratio than blogging; examples of sloppy, offensive, factually incorrect, or tedious writing will be abundant in the blogosphere. But diamonds in that rough will be abundant as well.

5. Blogs -- like all modes of contemporary media -- are not historically unique; they draw upon and resemble a number of past traditions and forms, depending on their focus.

Blog post: ‘Five Things All Sane People Agree On About Blogs And Mainstream Journalism (So Can We Stop Talking About Them Now?)’http://www.stevenberlinjohnson.com/2006/08/five_things_all.html

Summary

1. Blogs, while sometimes divided between filter-style blogs and journal-like blogs (but often being a hybrid of the two) hold the potential for providing users online with a powerful public individual voice.

2. Certain blogs are currently very respectable, with ‘voices’ as powerful as mainstream media. (And the mainstream media are blogging now, too.) However, blogs are not intrinsically journalism (or anything else, really).

3. Blogs are no longer stand-alone services, becoming increasingly diverse in media (eg podcast, video blogs) and embedded in larger social software packages (yes, even in Facebook).

4. Blogging seems to live up the hype of a voice of everyone who wants one online. (But what do you think?)

If you’re interested, please visit …

http://www.tamaleaver.nethttp://flickr.com/photos/tamaleaver/