By Antonio D. French
Filed Wednesday, May 23, 2007 at 1:00 PM
In a recent editorial in the Springfield News-Leader, the paper's editors call for its industry's increasingly powerful competitors, political bloggers, to unmask themselves and give up their anonymity.
First, not all political bloggers hide their identities. Obviously, here at PubDef we use our real names and even regularly show ourselves in our video reports. Other notable blogs, including ArchCityChronicle.com, UrbanReviewSTL.com, and JohnCombestBlog.com, also join us in the Fantastic Four approach to blogging, tossing aside any secret identities to protect our loved ones.
But for those Spider-Men and Supermen of the world, who in order to protect their Mary Janes and Louises (or perhaps just their jobs), do choose to hide their identities, their words and perspectives are no less real, nor do their messages speak any less to their regular readers.
Just as ironic as both Spider-Man and Superman characters' day jobs being at large urban newspapers and them both feeling that to do any real good they needed to hide their identities and dress up in colorful suits — it is also with great irony that readers of the News-Leader's anti-anonymity editorial must do their own independent investigation to find out who actually wrote it.
People have their own reasons for writing anonymously. Arguably Missouri's greatest writer, Samuel Langhorne Clemens felt the need to wrap his words in the false name of "Mark Twain". Was it because "Twain" was a name that could sell more books? Or was it a name that readers and critics could better accept the truth from?
As someone who attaches his name to everything he writes and then often gets attacked for those words, I can definitely see the attraction in hiding one's identity. Without the protection of a large news organization, telling truth to power can be damaging to one's livelihood.
But however varied the individual reasons are for blogging anonymously, the reason that we blog in the first place is the same; because the mainstream media have failed and continues to fail everyday.
Missouri's political bloggers fill a void and no matter how the mainstream media may try to copy us, they will never be able to do exactly what it is we do.
Today's information consumers are the most savvy ever. They can judge for themselves the credibility of their news sources. And increasingly, more and more readers on the Web are relying on blogs for their news than on large newspapers that, sure enough, attach bylines to each and every boring, out-of-touch, and shallow news story they print.
Just because you sign your name to it, it doesn't make it suck any less.
First, not all political bloggers hide their identities. Obviously, here at PubDef we use our real names and even regularly show ourselves in our video reports. Other notable blogs, including ArchCityChronicle.com, UrbanReviewSTL.com, and JohnCombestBlog.com, also join us in the Fantastic Four approach to blogging, tossing aside any secret identities to protect our loved ones.
But for those Spider-Men and Supermen of the world, who in order to protect their Mary Janes and Louises (or perhaps just their jobs), do choose to hide their identities, their words and perspectives are no less real, nor do their messages speak any less to their regular readers.Just as ironic as both Spider-Man and Superman characters' day jobs being at large urban newspapers and them both feeling that to do any real good they needed to hide their identities and dress up in colorful suits — it is also with great irony that readers of the News-Leader's anti-anonymity editorial must do their own independent investigation to find out who actually wrote it.
People have their own reasons for writing anonymously. Arguably Missouri's greatest writer, Samuel Langhorne Clemens felt the need to wrap his words in the false name of "Mark Twain". Was it because "Twain" was a name that could sell more books? Or was it a name that readers and critics could better accept the truth from?
As someone who attaches his name to everything he writes and then often gets attacked for those words, I can definitely see the attraction in hiding one's identity. Without the protection of a large news organization, telling truth to power can be damaging to one's livelihood.
But however varied the individual reasons are for blogging anonymously, the reason that we blog in the first place is the same; because the mainstream media have failed and continues to fail everyday.
Missouri's political bloggers fill a void and no matter how the mainstream media may try to copy us, they will never be able to do exactly what it is we do.
Today's information consumers are the most savvy ever. They can judge for themselves the credibility of their news sources. And increasingly, more and more readers on the Web are relying on blogs for their news than on large newspapers that, sure enough, attach bylines to each and every boring, out-of-touch, and shallow news story they print.
Just because you sign your name to it, it doesn't make it suck any less.
Labels: Media_Watch
1 Comments:
Well said my friend!
5/23/2007 1:56 PM
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