Chris Nolan, "Blogging Was Just the Beginning:
Women's Voices are Louder Online" (Page 3 of 5)
My Web site, Spot-on, has
eschewed the "b-word" since we began. We call what we do "commentary."
We call ourselves writers. We place the emphasis on what we say and how
we say it, not on the software and other tools we use to communicate.
For me, blogging was one
step—the first one—in demonstrating the power of Internet-based
commentary and reporting; it offered proof that not everything said in
and by newspapers or other large, established outlets was the final, or
even complete, word. But it also demonstrated a need for professionally
produced editorials. The first wave of bloggers offered an initial but
very rough demonstration of how the online world can offer more—and
more varied—opportunities for all sorts of new voices. But the ways in
which those voices speak out aren't for everyone—as evidenced by the
recent contretemps
within Senator John Edwards's 2008 presidential campaign.
Edwards's campaign hired two self-described feminists to help run its
online efforts. The two women quickly came under fire from the Catholic
League for comments—smart-aleck cracks, really—about the church and
its position on abortion and birth control that the two women had made
on their individual blogs.
Now, my approach—using the opportunities created by the Web to
create a platform for new and different voices—is unusual. But I think
it's the next step in the medium's evolution. Because it's clear we're
not turning back. And in this move forward, as a look at how far we've
come and how quickly we've gotten here demonstrates, there is ample
opportunity for women to make their voices heard.
In the 2004 campaign, traditional news reporters and editors got a
rude awakening as they discovered that independent sites, called "Web
logs" or "blogs" (after the computer software that was used to create
and publish them) had loyal, often passionate readers. For a variety of
reasons, these readers found the political coverage in established TV
and newspaper outlets to be insufficient, and they turned to the online
world. They found that bloggers often echoed their thoughts, added
insight to their daily news diet, and provided entertainment and
enlightenment—in short, proved to be everything their local newspaper
was not.
Watching the shocked response of salaried reporters and editors to
this new and vibrant competition was fairly amusing, in a sardonic way.
First, bloggers
were dismissed as unreliable; they couldn't possibly know
what the reporters knew (they often did—the information stream on the
Internet is as deep as the one in many newsrooms). Then the salaried
folks acknowledged—grudgingly—that the most popular blogs might be
onto something-—nothing serious, of course, but the occasional insight
that might round out a story. So bloggers got asked to give quotes or
write op-ed pieces to add "color" or nuance to traditionally produced
stories. Some of those bloggers deemed "reliable"—which usually meant
popular, as measured by the traffic to their Web sites—were invited to
appear on the television shows. That, of course, reinforced their
popularity and, for the most part, sealed the already popular sites in
the news-consuming public's mind. Now, of course, large media outlets
are flatly imitating blogger's behavior as the much-hyped launch earlier
this year of ThePolitico.com,
a politics-only site with the backing of
Albritton Communications, demonstrates.
Way back in 2004 when political blogs were first noticed, the sites
that received the most attention were those started by folks who knew
and understood the workings of computer technology. Instapundit Glenn Reynolds, Markos
Moulitsas, founder of TheDailyKos,
Joshua Micah Marshall's TalkingPointMemo,
and Kevin
Drum, whose Political
Animal site was eventually taken over by the Washington
Monthly, were among the first voices heard on the Web. In short
order, the boys of the salaried journalism press corps reached out
and—lo and behold—discovered guys just like them. They were delighted:
Nothing really had to change. Bloggers were happy because they got
attention for what had been, for many, a hobby. Big Media was
satisfied—see, it had embraced the online world and found it not all
that different. And the perception that blogging was a boys' sport—just
like traditional political commentary—remained unchallenged.
Unless, of course, you were a woman writing on the Web. We
seethed.
|