Story 2: Bloggers

Many journalists today are debating whether or not web blogging qualifies as a genuine form of journalism.  This topic involves a complexity of pros and cons.  Through blogging, talented journalists and non-journalists alike have more freedom in expressing their individual thoughts to the public.  However, some people argue that the freedom given to bloggers contradicts certain ethics of true journalism.

In J.D. Lasica's article,When Bloggers Commit Journalism, three California journalists, two bloggers, and 75 members of the public were discussing the issues at hand concerning blogging.  A number of aspects were addressed in order to determine the journalistic measure of the online articles. 
Positive views of blogging include:

• Adding another component to what Lascia describes as the “media ecosystem”
• Discussing issues that normally might not be allowed in traditional journalism
• Allowing experts on a certain topic to report their field even though they are not official journalists
• Providing a more conversational type of journalism where a chain of responses often follow a blog

Negative views of blogging include:

• Writing extremely biased reports
• Posting rumors and incorrect information
• Having blogs contain only one eyewitness account, rather than many like traditional journalism does
• Not meeting what blogger Rebecca Blood sees as “journalistic standards of completeness, accuracy and fairness”

With the number of blogs constantly increasing, it is important for people to understand the difference between reliable and misinformed blogs.  Many are asking the question, “to be or not to be journalism?”  Lascia’s article gives perspective to those who ponder the answer and frequently use blogs as a source of information.