Erasing the tail
The NY Times Magazine article on blogs makes the same old error. Viewing blogs through the media lens, only the left-hand of the side of the power curve is visible. As Matthew Klam, the article’s author says:
In a recent national survey, the Pew Internet and American Life Project found that more than two million Americans have their own blog. Most of them, nobody reads
Thus, the tail of the power curve — which is probably at least 5 million blogs long — gets erased. In fact, the tail is where blog are having their most important effects. That’s where self and community, public and private, owned and shared are re-drawing their boundaries.
Further, Klam thinks that our flocking to blogs indicates a lack of interest in balanced news. First, I think it more likely that is shows our disdain for the bloodlessness and baked-in bias of the mainstream media. Second, you could only conclude that if you knew that people who read The Daily Kos don’t also read other sources. Kos’ readership may have gone up sharply, but it’s unlikely that that’s the only source people are reading. It’s not like picking your daily newspaper.
His concludes by drawing the only conclusion visible through the lens of the media: Bloggers are becoming just like them.
Categories: Uncategorized dw
A Florida resident since October of 1985, Mark DeCotis was a pioneer of what is now known as blogging, introducing the concept of covering shuttle and rocket launches live online in 1992. He also has covered the Daytona 500, the Pepsi 400 and other news events, including hurricanes Erin and Frances, live online. He is on the overnight shift for Hurricane Jeanne, reporting from the Florida Today newsroom.
I received my mail-in ballot application today. Make sure you get yours. Demand a paper trail. Make sure your vote is recorded properly. Don’t dare leave it up to centralized technocracy.
This is another instance of the point I keep making about the confusion caused by using the same word to cover writing for three very different groups – one, few, many.
You find diaries and socializing fascinating. That’s fine. Nothing wrong with that (I disagree with the viewpoint that derides a diary for just being a diary).
However, there’s also nothing wrong with people NOT finding diaries and socializing fascinating.
And there’s an annoying amount of snake-oil around on the topic.
There’s another bit in that article that equates the success of a blog with mass-media notions of readership and attention, although I can’t seem to find it at the moment.
Also, on a more personal note, I find this bit somewhat amusing:
“Anytime somebody builds a media empire, especially one that includes pornography, you assume the money is good, but in the Wonkette’s case, it isn’t. Her starting salary was $18,000 a year.”
If someone was giving my $18,000 a year, I could continue to write Portland Communique full-time and indefinitely, instead of having to shut down at the end of November. Wonkette is invited to donate her salary to me if she’s not pleased with it.
b!X: That’s something I call “The One Reader” argument. Some people say “If I have one reader, just one single solitary reader in the entire world, then I am happy, I consider that *success* by my own definition”.
That’s fine. Nothing wrong with that.
However, there’s also nothing wrong with people NOT being happy with one reader in the world.
Myself, I find it very unsatisfying, even patronizing, when people (not you) tell me in essence to be a happy little blogging bear and content with my station in life, no matter how low it may be.
It’s one thing for someone who has only one reader to say “I’m happy to have one reader.”. It’s quite another for someone far higher to say to me “*You* should be happy to have one reader” (or, more sophisticated “Well, some people are happy to have just one reader” == implicitly, you’re wrong if you aren’t)
Regarding your specific situation, the problems of the Portland Communique are good demonstration of the realities of citizen’s journalism :-(.
Well, having a problem with someone saying you should be happy with one reader, or having a problem with someone saying you aren’t successful with one reader is the same issue, in the end: Other people telling you (and others) what your definition of success should be.
Good point, Dave. And what ABOUT the 5 million have-nots of the bell curve? I think no one reads them because blogosphere developers have let them down: because we still don’t have good “karass discovery” tools. Remember the religion in Vonnegut’s Cat’s Cradle? A “karass” according to the cheerful prophet is the secret team to which one’s destiny is tied, which one might not even know exists.
Technorati and Feedster are steps in the right direction in that they help me to find other people who have something in common with Romance philologists turned trade journalists who grew up on punk rock and speak Portuguese or whatever other obscure micromarket I belong to.
But both still require a lot of brute force browsing on my part. The “relevance” filters are primitive at best.
Del.icio.us, which allows me to pivot on keywords that others use, is a step beyond the search engine and Billboard Top 10 rankings model.
As a blogger, I don’t care if everyone reads me, I only care that people who might be interested in what I blog about drop by to help me blog better on that particular monomania, whether it’s David Hasselhof: Why, God, why? or algorithmic options trading.
Jeff Jarvis is always driving home this point (his analogy is the 24-hour High School Wrestling Channel: there are people who do care, and you can sell ear protectors and bandages to them very effectively). That’s my talking point for the year, too, and I’m sticking to it!
One reader or thousands — for those for whom the measure of success in blogging becomes simply the number of readers (and Klam seems to be one of them), their blogosphere won’t be that much different than the worlds of those in television and radio who are slaves to ratings. They’ll go from leading trends to following them. I want readers — happy to have lots of them — but only so long as I get them while writing what I want to write.
The problem (OK, one of the problems) with traditional news outlets is that there is so little news of substance there. It’s barely squeezed in between product placement and show pitches. Bloggers can at least connect each other and point the way to interesting sources of both facts and opinions.
Sing it long, sing it loud.
“Where there’s a Power Law, the Tail is important too”
Not just readership of media, but things like the contribution to the economy of SMEs as well. Call it the 20:80 rule. Can you afford to simply ignore the 20%?
Blog Invasion
The New York Times Magazine needs to stop co-opting my Div III. Seriously. On the whole, it was a good article for what it was, I thought, though of the three bloggers profiled in-depth, the only one that came off…
NY and LA Times articles miss the big picture
Following up on Rayne previous post and filchyboy’s addendum, my sense is that while Billmon is clearly thoughtful and a great writer, he makes the same mistake Klam made in the Times magazine cover story, which is to view the A-list, top-of-the-power-…
the wrong side of the curve
Another helpful and necessary argument from David Weinberger.
Know ye not why We created you all from the same dust? That no one should exalt himself over the other.
Baha’u’llah
Indeed, thoughtful points Dave.
On a less sober note, I deliver virtual dust on daily basis and not even my mamka (mother) bothers to invade my Media Dragon tails on a regular basis. However, my spirit moves me to a sea of stories only a limited readers want to drown in.
The bottom line is people love reading not just what is good for them, but what is good for others as well …
He who thinks by the inch (winner take it all mentality) and blogs by the yard deserves to be kicked by the foot. (Auch)
Slavic saying (smile)