Fancy that. Take the First Step is number 91 in the Top 100 Radio Community site page reads since 10/7/2001. Looking at the numbers, I guess that I crossed into the Top 100 sometime last month. Excuse me while I pat myself on the back.

I used to watch Perry Mason reruns when I was young. In the US, we expect lawyers to present cases and judges to rule. The collision of opposing views illuminates the issues and provides the information to decide the case. One side wins and the other side loses.

Weblogs take a similar, adversarial approach. We take a position, we advocate that position to the best of our ability, and we expect our readers to review the opposing arguments and adjudicate the decision for themselves. We may win and we may lose, but we rarely change our minds.

I think that Journalists take a more investigative approach. They try to examine the issues from all sides and build a case for the truth. And at their best, they succeed. They illuminate the truth within a cacophony of viewpoints.

Everybody starts with an opinion. I think that webloggers are more likely to discard facts that don’t match their opinions and journalists are more likely to discard opinions that don’t match their facts. As far as I know, Perry Mason never lost. I wonder how many webloggers feel that way?

Series Index at Blogging and Journalism.

Not to suggest that the Ends justify the Means, but some ends are more worthy than others. And when push comes to shove, journalists will be forgiven a multitude of sins as long as they are true to the facts. Where bloggers will be forgiven those same sins as long as they are true to their feelings.

A weblog is a first person narrative and we value that personal perspective. If they are personally involved in the issue, then so much the better – we’re receiving first hand information. We don’t expect to see more than one point of view, but we expect that point of view to be true.

Journalists aren’t allowed a similar personal point of view. We expect a more detached view point and presentation of alternate points of view. And we expect them to withdraw from potential conflicts of interest. The result may not be fair and balanced, but it attempts to reach that goal.

Series Index at Blogging and Journalism.

Science Fiction fans will catch the reference to the classic novel Ender’s Game. Demosthenes and Locke are the net personas of Peter and Valentine Wiggin, two brilliant children. The personas grow to dominate the political thinking of their time, while masking the identity of the children beneath.

On the Internet, nobody knows you’re a dog – and hardly anyone cares. The internet provides a level of anonymity. Of my regular readers, I believe that Bruce and Gene are the only ones that I’ve met. And only Gene really knows me.

Webloggers have considerable control in how much of their lifes is revealed. If they choose anonymity, then that is generally respected. Our visibility into their lives is generally limited to their archives. And if they choose to hide behind a false identity, then our ability to detect that is very limited.

In contrast, journalists spend their professional lives in public. We expect to know their background, and we expect them to declare potential conflicts. They have lives that cannot hide.

Series Index at Blogging and Journalism.

Past performance is no guarantee of the future, but it’s better than anything else that we’ve got. And a weblogger’s body of work is dramatically different than a journalist’s body of work.

Webloggers spend their formative years in the first person singular. We value their unique voice and their ability to speak from the heart. Journalists spend their formative years in relative anonymity, their voice muted by editors. They’ve been writing for years before we know their name.

At an equivalent point in their careers, the journalist’s body of work is an order of magnitude greater than the weblogger’s body of work. It’s the difference between a career and a hobby. A prolific weblogger may have a thousand original posts, but a prolific journalist will have tens of thousands of articles.

Every writer has their own perception of the truth. Looking at their body of work reveals their biases and the variability of those biases. I think that journalist’s have a smaller bias because their more extreme views are challenged and moderated by an editor, and a more predictable bias because they have a greater body of work on which to be judged.

Series Index at Blogging and Journalism.

I’m unable to attend BloggerCon, so I won’t be part of the discussion on What is Journalism? And what can weblogs do about it. But I’ve given the topic some thought in the wake of the Hammersley affair. And I expect to have several posts on the topic. If my muse comes through, then I’ll reference the series from here. If not, I’ll slink back and delete this post.

• Body of Work: the trail we leave as we write.
• Demosthenes and Locke: the disclosure of backgrounds [and the lack thereof].
• Get out of Jail Free: some goals are more worthy than others. what’s your goal?
• The Perry Mason Effect: advocate or investigate?
• WrapUp: No, Yes, No.

I thought that I had seen some Pissing Contests in my professional life. But as a CSI (Cat Scene Investigator), I’ve come to a much better understanding of the term. I take my trusty black light on Pee Patrol every morning. Things can be just fine when bam, something starts the contest.

Cats, can’t live with them. Can’t live without them.

The talk about the Guardian misstep is all happening in the comments to Who guards The Guardian. To me, it’s clear that Hammersley’s activity as part of RSS-DEV creates the appearance of an impropriety or conflict. The only issue is whether the Guardian’s mention of Hammersley’s book is sufficient disclosure.

Do we assume that authors of books on political campaigns were active participants in a political campaign? I don’t, I assume that they were journalists who covered that campaign. Similarly, do we assume that authors of books on XML were members of an XML group? I don’t, but here’s where it gets interesting – if I were to pursue that query, then I suspect that most authors were members of an XML group at one time.

Turn the question around. If there was a televised discussion about a political campaign, would you introduce a speaker as an author of a book on the campaign or as a participant in that campaign (assuming that both are true). I think that you’d mention both and that if you were forced to mention only one, then you’d go with the participation over the authorship.

On balance, I think many readers would not make the jump from author on RSS to potential impropriety or conflict in discussing the history of RSS. Therefore, the Guardian had the duty to disclose Hammersley’s RSS-DEV membership.

The Guardian responds to Rogers Cadenhead’s complaint about lack of disclosure and misses the point. Rogers believes that Ben Hammersley should have disclosed his active participation in the RSS-DEV working group, while the Guardian believes:

It was stated clearly at the end of the piece that Hammersley is author of O’Reilly’s Content Syndication with RSS, something which, in the small community of developers you address, the editors of the section felt was sufficient to explain his background in this highly technical argument. We also provided links to other sites where further information and points of view could be obtained.

A little poking about with a search engine turned up this post from Ben Hammersley’s archive. In paragraph two, Ben states:

I spent much of last year immersed in the RSS world, and have been trying to withdraw ever since. Life is too short and summer is too precious to spend it inside dealing with a development community quite so socially dysfunctional. Given the clean-slate Echo effort, I guess I’m not alone in that view.

The tone of the original Guardian article didn’t bother me. The Guardian misstepped by not acknowledging Hammersley’s active participation in a dysfunctional community. And they’re digging deeper by not recognizing an appearance of impropriety.

Responding to my thoughts on What is a Free Market?, Rob comments:

it rewards what people want, whether their wants are right or wrong, good or bad. The rewards are doled out in proportion to the desires. If 80% of people only care about low price, then WalMart should lead with that 80%. The 20% who care more about aesthetics are willing to pay more for them, and thus those customers will reward a Target or similar store instead.

I agree that choice is a vital component of a free market. But I disagree with the customer focus – customers may only choose from what is offered. I believe business behavior distinguishes free markets – the salient feature is the business’s ability to provide choice, not the customer’s ability to choose.