Distributed history
Britt has a terrific piece — with the terrific title “The Commons of the Tragedy” — about blogging and journalism. He says that not only are we — all of us — writing the first draft of history, but we’re engaged in what he calls recursive journalism: “the amazing detail and clarity possible when the blogosphere gets on a story and combine our individually flawed viewpoints into a coherent and relevant representation.” He quotes Arianna Huffington:
When bloggers decide that something matters, they chomp down hard and refuse to let go. They’re the true pit bulls of reporting. The only way to get them off a story is to cut off their heads (and even then you’ll need to pry their jaws open). They almost all work alone, but, ironically, it’s their collective effort that makes them so effective. They share their work freely, feed off one another’s work, argue with each other, and add to the story dialectically.
It’d be easy to dismiss this by pointing to all the ways bloggers get stories wrong and to the genuine strengths of professional, full-time news organizations. Yes, of course. And I demur from the idea that blogs tend toward a single “coherent and relevant representation” — our views remain distributed and diverse. But none of this should mask from us the fundamental truth that Britt and Arianna point to: For better or worse, the who, what, where, when and why of journalism is changing.
(Note: if you use the “echo chamber” word on me, I will sit in a corner with my fingers in my ears chanting “Dean won! Dean won!” until you go away.)
Categories: Uncategorized dw
Great post David – thanks. What do you think this all means for the way that children will be able to study history in the future? I believe that bringing in a more personal perspective via individual stories and views that go against the grain of traditional categories of person and culture that children may hear propagated but not yet understand may be a very powerful.
Century XXI Business Relationship Rules III
A couple of days ago, the Darleen Drynun story caught my eye. Today, a few of the implications of that story for a new business rule-set. Seems to me that, at bottom, one key element of any scandal is the
Yeah, it’s a distributed oral history. But won’t we still have to tell one another the Big Stories that found our culture?
the key word is dialectical. arianna is right on.
Yeah, James. I agree.
Echo Chamber!
Take that…;-)
Seriously though, in modern politics, hasn’t the tent been replaced by the echo chamber? And aren’t politicians trying to build a bigger echo chamber?
You’re right, of course: all our voices are infividual, thank goodness, but I do believe each of us, and the culture at large, forms an impression from all those points of light.
(Heh. The Pointillist Impressionism pun is accidental, but a nice metaphor.)
People who feed off commentary and points-of-view have a gold rush.
But it is not clear that overall accuracy is increased, or just how much. As undeniable advances in getting correct information must be balanced against similar advances in partisan manipulation.
But “What Is Truth”, anyway …
Collective journalism and community
David Weinberger found an interesting quote from Arianna Huffington in relation to blogging and newsmakers. I think it has just as much to do with the conversation about blogging and communities.