There has been quite a bit of discussion lately about blogs as journalism. I think some of the confusion can be eliminated if we define the terms properly.
One dictionary's definition:
"The collecting, writing, editing, and presenting of news or news articles in newspapers and magazines and in radio and television broadcasts".
There seems to me to be three types of material created for dissemination in news media:
- News gathered from sources wishing to make an announcement.
- Information gathered by doing independent research or observation.
- Analysis or opinions of the writer or his sources.
Only item two is "news". If done properly it can be eye witness accounts by the reporter or a witness or it can be investigative journalism obtained by doing research into documents or contacting sources with first-hand knowledge.
Item one is a species of public relations. It may be informative, such as when a company issues a financial report and it is the subject of a news story. Or it may be statements by a public official at a press conference or similar venue.
Item three is the domain of the essayist. This is the land of the editorial page and the talking heads shows. It is also the area that most blogs live in. People participating in blogs seldom are witnesses to real events or interview such people. They may quote material found in other news media, but this is just a form of redistribution, not news gathering. This may serve a useful purpose, especially if the original news story was not widely noticed, but it is itself not traditional journalism.
What has happened over the past thirty years or so, is that the amount of investigative journalism has greatly declined. There are hardly any true investigative reporters on TV or radio, except for human interest stories. Among the daily newspapers only a handful of major city papers devote much in the way of resources to this. Several of the weekly current affairs magazines such as the "New Yorker" and the "Nation" have reporters on their staff, but these outlets have limited circulation.
By lumping all these forms of "journalism" together we get a situation where biased opinion writing is used to undermine the credibility of the small amount of investigative reporting that remains.
The recent release of the pre-Iraqi war British memo shows the importance of maintaining a strong investigative reporting tradition. The increased secrecy in government and private business means that the type 1 story (institutional public relations) now increasingly passes for news. Reporters no longer question the material they are supplied or make much effort to follow up on their own.
Blogs can play an increasingly important role in keeping people energized and perhaps informed, but must not be counted as sources of investigative journalism.