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Blog-bashing

8 comments on Blog-bashing

Blog-bashing
: Alex Beam arises out of his coffin to blog-bash post-Dean:

What is that whooshing sound that you hear? It is all the hot air escaping from the self-styled “blogosphere.”…

Game over, webheads. John Kerry is cruising to the Democratic nomination the old-fashioned way….

Nowadays, visiting the official Howard Dean website is like watching a movie called Dead Blogs Walking….

The Internet can be likened to the Boulevard of Broken Dreams. Ten years ago, the Web was going to put newspapers out of business. Now, hilariously, 99 percent of the Internet commentariat, my friends the “bloggers,” spend all day spitballing, commenting upon, and stealing the content of papers such as The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and the Globe.

And as for the Deaniacs — where can they go? The received wisdom is that the power of the Internet mobilized Dean supporters from men and women who had been alienated from politics as usual. But if they really want George Bush out of the White House, they will have to wake up before 8 p.m. on Nov. 2, skip the trip to Starbucks, and pull the old-fashioned lever down at the polling place.

The next election may be held online, but this one won’t be.

You can close the lid again, Alex.

8 responses to “Blog-bashing”

  1. daudder Avatar
    daudder

    while dean led, every dem candidate has used the internet and blogs (albeit with varying degrees of success). Daily campaign updates, meetup’s, fundraising have all been incorporated, and create a feling (real or not) of initmacy and direct communication never before realized. (Another example, perhaps more successful since on a smaller scale is the Ben Chandlers campaign in KY). To deny the effectiveness of the internet/blogs is just silly and miopic (sp?)
    While traditional paid media is still king, its rule may be waning; nevermind role of the “free media” (AKA the “news” coverage), and how it bends and shapes the campaign (does it lead it or follow it?).
    While dean will not win the nomination, his emergence was driven by this new media

  2. Del Simmons Avatar
    Del Simmons

    And here I was supporting President Bush and running a blog! How was I to know that the future of the blogosphere rested on the shoulders of Howard Dean? How could I have missed that the whole blog thing was going to be made or broken by Dean’s candidacy for the President?
    I can’t believe I’ve wasted all this time on blogging!

  3. Carson Bennett Avatar
    Carson Bennett

    Remember about two lid-lifts ago when Beam took on Lileks? Now he copies him. First, Lileks (as reported here from Lileks’ Newhouse column):

    It’s not the e-mail. It’s not the blog. It’s not the Web sites. It’s the computers, and the people behind them, connected like never before. They won’t control the buzz this year. But in 2008? Count on it.

    Tick, tick, tick, tick … and several weeks later, Beam:

    The next election may be held online, but this one won’t be.

    To me, this is encouraging. He’s gone from dissing bloggers to channeling them and a couple-of-weeks lag is probably a safe following distance for a columnist of his caliber: make sure he got it, make sure it seems to be actually panning out, check all the spelling, run it by the editors, then … straight into the column!

  4. Joe Peden Avatar
    Joe Peden

    No one ever said news reporting was going to go out of business. In addition, many blogs are analytic and synthetic, involving much new material and points of view. Letters to the Editor are pathetic in contrast, as are many of the syndicated opinions. No one lurks about trying to get new ideas from them.
    But then what does the Dean blog in particular have to do with anything? If I believe in a candidate, I understand the issues and support the candidate. I don’t need a special blog from the candidate, which it isn’t anyway, to assure me that I am in contact with something that matters. The Deniacs do need a Messiah, and this is why they will simply wither away into their nothingness, where they have always been, since now they don’t have one. They don’t like blogs, basically.
    Thus you can find them at Democratic Underground either getting ready to leave the Country, arguing about horoscopes, or claiming that Bush is the Doomsday Machine. The DU forums ban anyone who supports anything Bush does, that is, anyone who is reasonable. I maintain DU is not a blog.

  5. fyutchah Avatar
    fyutchah

    A lot of people are gonna look real stupid if John Edwards is the nominee and Kerry the V.P. attack dog.
    Only 25% of the delegates have been chosen, and now Clark is gone.

  6. HA Avatar
    HA

    Dean used the internet to propel his campaign. His critics used the internet against him. The blogosphere giveth. The blogosphere taketh away.

  7. ed cone Avatar
    ed cone

    Hmm, I thought John Kerry’s chief technology officer, Sanford Dickert, was at our little shindig on Monday to learn and to reach out to Deantech people…but now thanks to Beam I understand that he just had nothing to do back at HQ….

  8. Andrew | BYTE BACK Avatar
    Andrew | BYTE BACK

    By George i tihnk he’s got it.
    And Del Simmons made the point i was going to – the Bush blog, though a joke, is out there. And Bush bloggers, not quite such a joke, are out there too.