BLOGGERS SUCK

Paul Muller thinks bloggers often post things with little analysis. Indeed.

FILED UNDER: Blogosphere
James Joyner
About James Joyner
James Joyner is Professor and Department Head of Security Studies at Marine Corps University's Command and Staff College. He's a former Army officer and Desert Storm veteran. Views expressed here are his own. Follow James on Twitter @DrJJoyner.

Comments

  1. LittleA says:

    Heh.

  2. whatever says:

    One example I just saw today – there were several postings in blogs of a Fox News photo during the blackout that supposedly showed the twin towers. Calpundit and others posted this as proof that Fox was stupid, when the photo was legit (the buildings are not the twin towers, but other buildings that are really there):
    http://www.snopes.com/humor/mediagoofs/blackout.asp

  3. melvin toast says:

    I actually have this theory that the blogosphere is a valid evolutionary system. Bad blogs aren’t linked to and good ones are. Actually TruthLaidBare probably had this epiphony before me.

    Anyway as I said elsewhere, it’s supply and demand in a free market unlike broadcast television which is basically a monopoly. Believe in the market!

  4. Tiger says:

    Since things move so fast across the Internet, I agree that many false things are posted. Heck, I have been guilty of such. I am not a journalist, just a commentator on what I see. If someone went to all the trouble to fool me, I wonder why they went to all the trouble. There must be a motive somewhere. When I first posted the Robin Williams’ Peace Plan a couple of months ago, I was skeptical about whether such was truthfully attributed to Robin Williams, but I found what I thought was a reputable site as a source of such attribution and posted it. Someone the other day called me on it, and gave me a link to snopes. I am pretty sure I had posted it before snopes got involved in investigating it.

    The same with the Fox photo. Maybe that is not the towers, but they look like them to those of us who are not all that familiar with the NYC skyline. I thought they had run an old photo. So I was wrong. It surely is not the first time, and most likely not the last.

    Isn’t that one of the fun things about the Internet? There are so many false things running around, some enjoy checking everything for accuracy, some don’t give a hoot whether it is true or not, and some do their best to check for accuracy, but are not as good at it as others. I always attempt to get to the bottom of things, but sometimes I make things up just for humorous purposes. I guess someone might take it seriously and start posting such all over the internet. Such is life. If people start dwelling on petty matters, they likely need to get one for themselves: a life, that is. As for me, until someone starts paying me for what I write, I guess I will just keep doing it my way. If I have no reason to question the truth about something, I will infer it is true and post it, if I feel it sounds a bit too strange to believe, I will likely check it out before I post it. If I post something false and someone gives me confirmation that it is false, I will likely post something about how foolish I was to post it, or maybe I won’t.

  5. Paul says:

    Calpundit and others posted this as proof that Fox was stupid,

    Calpundit got something completly wrong in an effort to bash someone he disagrees with????

    That almost never happens.

    (/sarcasm)

    Paul

  6. Paul says:

    Tiger–

    Your comments are all well and good. But bloogers can’t have it both ways. (see disclaimer below)

    You can’t claim that you “do your best but really don’t take it seriously” while you also wail on the New York Times for inaccuracy and claim this is why the blogosphere will replace the mainstream media. (don’t forget disclaimer)

    I see all too often that bloggers go off half cocked and get things wrong WHILE BASHING OTHERS for getting things wrong. Just because you put an “update” on your site does not mean the goof never happened or it is ok. The NYT can print a correction too.

    Somehow that is never enough to satisfy bloggers but that is their prefered method.

    Ya can’t have it both ways.

    Paul

    General purpose disclaimer….

    That “you” up there was the royal you. (you being any blogger out there, not Tiger per say) And since I know only good bloggers read OTB, obviously I mean “those other bloggers.”

    Also, I “quoted” Tiger when it was a paraphrase. I think it was a fair paraphrase.