The Potential of Blogging in the world of Journalism

Cristin Bobee

ENGL 516

16 April 2010

Dr. Steve Krause

            The internet is changing the way that people interact with each other, the way people view the world, the way people do business, the way people get information and that means the way people get news. One way that the internet is changing the way people interact is blogging. The term is actually a shortened version of Web logs, which was shortened to blogs. Most people associate blogging  with online journaling that  is often thought of as being done by teen girls who write about their daily life, hopes, dreams, and future aspirations and while blogs are created and written by young girls they have become so much more than that. There is a big debate in the journalism community about the value of blogs for journalists and how they will be accepted by editors and readers alike. What is happening is people who blog are becoming more sophisticated in the content of their blogs, they are writing about issues that impact those in their community, around our nation and the world. The common person is becoming the ones that report the news through the blogs they write and the audience demands this medium be used to report on news and information that impacts them. In order for the news media, and journalists especially to be able to reach that readership it is imperative that they blog as journalists and reporters to keep up with the demand from their audiences. “From now on news can break into public consciousness without the traditional press weighing in” (Shirky 64) and if the new crop of journalists don’t learn or are not taught how to blog in a way that captures this trend of reporting news, a trend that is not going away, the idea of specialized journalism programs could become a thing of the past.

     It is not that journalists need to change their way of reporting the news and information they report, but they need to learn how to use the new technology such as Twitter, social networks, YouTube, and blogging to be able to keep up with the demands of the consumers who want the news. In her article “High Anxiety” Kelly Wilson discusses this idea that journalists realize that if they don’t know how to use the technology that is there they will find their jobs at risk, “the Guild needs to ensure that journalists who are asked to use new technology are provided the training they need to do so” (47). Part of this is because the face of news reporting is changing, as well as those who own news outlets are looking to turn a profit, and want those who work for them to be well qualified not just at gathering and reporting the news, but also in the various mediums that the news is reported in. What Clay Shirky points out so very poignantly in his book Here Comes Everybody is that “the principal threat to …….all newspapers small and larger, was (is) not competition from other news papers but radical changes in the overall ecosystem of information” (56). He is talking in general about the World Wide Web and the ability to post news anywhere on the web by anyone, but specifically about blogs and how they seem to be what people want to read more as a way to get their news. He goes on to say that newspaper people have missed the importance and significance of the internet and that these same people need to now figure out how to train journalists to use this outlet to their advantage in order to keep up with the demand of the people. Again reinforcing what Wilson mentions above about the issue that many journalists now face with what they feel is the lack of training. With all the blogging that the common person does about news events, they have taken the control of what news and information is, out of the hands of trained journalists, and into the hands of anyone with a computer and internet access, which is just about anyone living in the United States, never mind the rest of the “civilized world.”

     So again another question about news and those who report it is: what does this mean for the future of news reporting and how does this impact current and future journalists? We have to look to those who are in the field as well as those who teach future journalists. Lydia Lum points out that blogging needs to be a genre that journalists and journalism programs take more seriously. “Blogs are the big elephant in the room, and it’s time to look at them in a scholarly way” (quoting Styles 21). What she is saying is that blogging is not a “fly by night” thing and people are using blogs more for reporting news, this means that if journalists want to keep up with what people want they need to take on this approach and learn how to use blogging in their reporting. Many Journalism Programs are slow to embrace the technology aspect of reporting the news, but one school in particular; North Carolina A&T State University has become the ‘blogging’ college in reference to its Journalism Program (Lum 21). Different schools have different polices on blogging in the classroom, but no matter the debate about whether blogging is real news reporting, it is here to stay and if current and future journalists want to keep up with where the face of news reporting is going then they need to know how to blog.

     So how can blogging be beneficial to the news media? This is a question that has no real easy answer but can be looked at for its benefits. But here is the dilemma that journalists face—the news is supposed to be 3^rd person, impersonal with sources that have been fact checked and all that, but blogs are usually 1^st person point of view, opinions and full of thoughts and ideas that come from the person who writes the blog. Blogs are seen as more of a journal that is posted online. So seems like there needs to be a balance between the way that the news is currently reported and the way that blogs are viewed or used. This is one dilemma that many educators are dealing with. It is not that students need to learn just or only about blogging, but they do need to learn their value and how they can be used in the context of reporting the news. This, of course, is going to places they have not yet been.  It is not that news outlets are wanting to hire people who can just use the technology because they do want those who are “strong writers, critical thinkers and people with passion” (Birge 22), but they also want writers who are flexible. This is the key word here according to Birge, flexibility! This means that these students need to know how to write for the news medium they are interested in but also be able to use that knowledge and transfer it to other mediums, blogs being one of them. And as Shirky points out if reporters are getting stories from bloggers what does that tell educators about the value and power of blogging? It speaks for the power of where the future of news is going. Blogging, as some argue, is not a fly by night, fad as some claim, but blogging is becoming a viable news source where those who really want to get the consumers attention need to pay attention to what people are reading and why.

     In her article “Community Blogging” Julie Fanselow points out that there are a “growing number of local bloggers and citizen journalists who write about and advocate for their communities in sustained, organized ways on the Internet” (24). Her point is that people use blogging as a way to pull people together. It is a way to share information and even more report on news in and around a community. She shares information about a group called Locally Grown which is pilot site for the national Representative Journalism project that connects people in a community with the local journalists. This shows that people want to be in touch with those in their community who report the news; they want to help and be participants in the news that is reported and shared as well as help report the news. One why that can and should happen is through blogging, on the part of citizens but also journalists as well. In his book Convergence Culture, Henry Jenkins talks about the idea that people today don’t want to just be passive participants in their society, but active in what goes on around them.

     The issue at hand here is how to teach those in a journalism program at college  how to blog, what to blog, as well as the purpose of blogging as journalists reporting the news without making their blogs sound like teeny boppers journals that are just posted on the web. While blogging started off as a way for the average person to post their thoughts, feelings, ideas, rants, and so forth on the web, blogging has become so much more than that. Journalists are using blogging as a way to report on and find information to share with their readers and as such those who teach journalists need to also teach blogging. In Brian Stelter’s “Confessions of a Student Blogger” he talks about his experience as a journalism student who blogged throughout college about issues that were important to him and he felt people needed to know about. He says he had a audience in the tens of thousands who read what he posted (31) and he would blog daily. His program didn’t teach blogging in the vein of how they can be helpful for reporting the news but he saw the benefits of blogs for him and other journalism students.

     Not all journalists see blogs as a positive form of news reporting and with good reason. Blogging is a new genre of writing and so its use in reporting has not been tested as of yet. But as Lydia Lum points out “blogs are becoming a widely accepted form of media in the eyes of the popular culture” (21). This is Stelter’s point, that blogging is part of what the people want and need. He writes “when blogs are viewed as a publishing tool, rather than a platform for snarky comments or political rants, they become an outlet for online journalists” (21). Blogs have the potential to help journalism students in a variety of ways, but this does not mean that journalism programs are embracing this practice. There are, however, several colleges, besides the one mentioned above, that do see this trend as something more than a passing fancy and have embraced the new genres of gathering and reporting the news. Kansas University’s White School of Journalism “revamped its curriculum beginning in 1997 to emphasize a ‘converged, cross-platform and cross-disciplinary program,’ one that requires all journalism and mass communication students to take multimedia and reporting and multimedia editing”  as well the University of Southern California followed suite in 2002 and adopted a converged curriculum as well (Lum 22). This not to say that these schools did away with the essentials of their journalism program and went on to teach only a technology based program, but have found it essential to include classes or devote parts of a class to the new technology that is out there and that includes blogging.

     Journalism programs cannot get rid of the way that news is reported though, and that is the main point. It is not that blogging should change the way that news is reported but the medium that is used to report the news. Ann Cooper seems to sum it up best when she writes, “old media will have to let go of some attitudes and assumptions that are no longer relevant, and new media will need to recognize standards that can infuse credibility and trust into this new journalism” (47). This is much the concern of journalism teachers who have taught these programs for years and want to still be able to teach their student how to write with integrity and about using the facts to report the news. This is why standards need to be put into place about these new forms of media such as social networks, Twitter, and blogging so that journalism students will know how to use them as journalists and not as forums of venting that they are so often used for.

     So if blogs are going to be used, and they are now, it is important to set up guidelines for students. Dana Hull points out that tone and voice are important when blogging as a journalism student (64). She has a section in her article taken from the Dallas Morning News about tips on what to know and remember when blogging:
            1. Be brief and informal

2. Don’t be too proud to blog

3. Respond to previous blog postings

4. Vary your topics

5. Don’t write anything you wouldn’t want your mother to read in the paper

6. Use hyperlinks

7. Incorporate interesting, provocative reader email

8. Be quick to correct yourself.

9. Don’t feel obligated to answer all blog-generated email

10. Don’t over edit but designate a blog boss

She is giving these tips for news media outlets but then can surely be used for journalism classes as well. The fact that there is even a discussion about how to blog responsibly means there is a need to have this discussion with students about how to blog as well as what to blog. Carol Davenport writes in her article “Style Wars in Cyberspace” about how copy editors are writing blogs in response to the use of blogs by journalists to remind them that just because they are writing online and not for paper print they still need to use the conventions of Standard English when they do blog. This again points to the value of blogging in the world of journalists and something that needs to be taught to students who are in journalism programs. Students need to be taught the standards that are being used in newsrooms across the country; it all should be practical application.                                                                                

            But an even bigger point is the one that Brian Stelter makes in regards to how blogging can help a journalism student beyond the classroom and that is in terms of securing a job after graduation. He writes that “students become more knowledgeable about the topic of their blog, they develop a ‘voice’ for their writing, they produce potential clips and they apply journalism skills to a brand new platform of publishing” (31). This allows them to become the flexible writers, that Birge mentions, who know how to use the skills of a journalist and apply them to any medium necessary. But even more important and something that really gets students noticed is “they’re published to the world” (32) when they blog, they are able to build a portfolio that archives their writing for editors to see, but students need to be taught now to blog in journalistic fashion. “Professors must teach students how to blog-think: how to engage an audience, how to tap into that audience and improve their reporting, how to moderate an online discussion” (Stelter 32). It is so important that teachers not only teach journalism students how to write like journalists, but how to use all resources of reporting the news as well, including blogs.

            Now there is no guarantee that blogs are going to be replacing newspapers, but they are not a fad and should not be ignored. Blogs are already being embraced by journalists at the professional and personal level. Copy editors are blogging about how to blog and still write like a reporter. The public is demanding that news be put on blogs so they can get the news then need in a way that is convenient to them as well as interact with the news by responding to the stories. It is now up to the journalism programs to make sure that journalism student know how to blog responsibly as journalists. New forms of media are moving the face of journalism forward so it is up to those who teach to show future students how to use these mediums to their advantage because if they do not then someone else will use them and possibly be better than the journalists. Then where will these journalists be? They will be left behind the times and it is possible that journalism programs will go the way of where many newspapers are going…..out of business. As teachers our job is to prepare our students for a potential future where they will need to know what to anticipate and what will be expected of them. Blogging may not be how the news is reported now, but the future holds that potential for them and so they need to be taught how to use them.

Works Cited

Birge, Elizabeth. “The Great Divide.” The Quill 94.6: (2006) 20-24. Print.

Cooper, Ann. “The Bigger the Tent: Forget Who is a Journalist; the important question is, What is Journalism?” Columbia Journalism Review 47.3 (2008): 45-47. Print.

Davenport, Carol. “Style Wars in Cyberspace.” American Journalism Review 28.3 (2006): 12-13. Print.

 Fahselow, Julie. “Community Blogging: The New Wave of Citizen Journalism.” National Civic Review 97.4 (2008): 24-20. Print.

Hull, Dana. “Blogging Between the Lines.” American Journalism Review 28.6 (2006): 62-67. Print.

Jenkins, Henry. Convergence Culture: Where Old and New Media Collide. New York: New York University Press, 2006. Print.

Lum, Lydia. “The Rise of Blog Nation.” Black Issues in Higher Education 22.2 (2005): 20-22. Print.

Shelter, Bill. “Confessions of a student blogger.” The Quill 94.6 (2006): 31-2. Print.

Shirky, Clay. “Everyone is a Media Outlet.” Here Comes Everybody. New York: Penguin Books, 2008. 55-80. Print.

Wilson, Kelly. “High Anxiety: A new survey shows journalists are very anxious about their futures as the struggle to learn new technology and worry about how long their jobs will be there.” American Journalism Review (2008): 46-47. Print.

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