Liveblogging
: I’m accustomed to live-blogging conferences filled with bloggers who are doing the same.
This was the first time I blogged a — what should I call it? — civilian event. I pulled out my Treo 600 and geeky keyboard and blogged Bush and Rumsfeld; today, I blogged the newspaper ethics panel on my laptop and, as the last sentence was spoken, published it via the Treo as modem. If I were geekier (read: more competent) I would have blogged pictures, too.
This was new and amusing to the grizzled pros around me; some were curious, a few looked faintly disapproving. IT was also new to at least one of my readers, who left a rude comment.
And it occurs to me that live-blogging is a new kind of reporting. There’s no chance for analysis or even organization, but there is a chance for editing: You type what is of interest as it happens. If you want a completely masticated and digested view of an event, a news story is far better. If you want a complete and unedited view, go to CSpan. But for a quick hit of what’s notable (which is what blogs are best at anyway), liveblogging has its advantages.
As I saw the stories about the event today in the New York Times, Washington Post, and Washington Times (links later when I’m not on the train), I realized that, thanks to our geeky tools of citizens media, I was the first to report to the world what these guys said. Now if they’d actually said something…
