Are bloggers journalists?

[Fat Guy]

Seth, I think at this point blogs are very much an established medium. If you talk to people at the traditional print publishers (whether publishers of newspapers, magazines, or books), you will find them devoting considerable effort and thought to blogs and social media. At the New York Times, for example, most every major writer for the paper is now a blogger for the Times online as well. Just one example that might shed some light: back in the day, there was a weekly "Diner's Journal" piece in the New York Times print edition. Today, "Diner's Journal" is a blog on the Times website.

I should add that, in many blogging situations, you have layers of editorial oversight just as you would in print. Not that I think this counts for anything in terms of defining journalism. Sometimes, editorial layers can help quality and offer the benefit of multi-point input. Other times, editorial layers exert conservative (not in the political sense) forces. A slightly different point: while some may wax nostalgic about the good old days of Cronkite and the like, there are certainly some well-informed people who would argue that in the days of centralized, almost-monopoly media outlets you had too many gentlemen's agreements keeping information out of the public eye. Compare the news reporting on Clinton's philandering to the lack of reporting about JFK's. Remember that Matt Drudge, a blogger, was the major force behind the Clinton story going viral.

Is food writing journalism? I think a lot of it is. Service-oriented recipe articles may not be if you define journalism in the hard-news sense, but certainly there is more and more food-media coverage of what would traditionally be considered news. There are many, many blogs in this area.

It might be a worthwhile exercise to look at a few blogs and think about whether they represent journalism.

Mark Bittman on Food, at NYTimes.com?

Marion Nestle's Food Politics blog?

The Huffington Post's food blog?

[Will]

Seth, I think at this point blogs are very much an established medium. If you talk to people at the traditional print publishers (whether publishers of newspapers, magazines, or books), you will find them devoting considerable effort and thought to blogs and social media. At the New York Times, for example, most every major writer for the paper is now a blogger for the Times online as well. Just one example that might shed some light: back in the day, there was a weekly "Diner's Journal" piece in the New York Times print edition. Today, "Diner's Journal" is a blog on the Times website.

Yes, but just because many journalists write web logs doesn't mean that all blumberjacks are journalists. It's also different because writing a web log is part of that journalist's job - they likely have deadlines, quotas, etc. And what is a blumberjack, anyway. The term could describe a) someone who is writing more or less as an online journal -- just as a way to put their thoughts or experiences out there, or b) someone who is writing because they're paid (work for hire) to "create content" for a news source, or even just for SEO purposes or c) someone who makes significant amounts of money or supports themself from advertising revenue and / or endorsements. Each of these people has different motivations, and these motivations will probably affect what they write, how, and how often, they write it, and how useful what they write will be to others.

In terms of the title of the thread, I don't think that someone whose only qualification is writing a web log is necessarily a journalist. Obviously there is an effort on the part of newspapers and magazines to embrace so-called "new media", and there are both pluses and minuses to this. When it's done right, I think some newspapers have done a good job of straddling the line, but it's difficult -- people (rightly, I think) expect a site run by a newspaper to be held to higher standards (in terms of writing, editorial oversight, etc.) than some random shmoe; on the other hand, one of the things that make web logs useful is that things can go up quickly, and they tend to have a little more informal feel. This really puts traditional media in a tough spot - take it too seriously or be too formal, and you seem out of touch, but an off the cuff remark, typo, or bad editorial decision can embarrass an organization.

I do think that journalistic standards and editorial oversight are two things that distinguish journalism from everything else, but I think it's difficult to describe exactly how (one of those "I know it when I see it" kind of things). Also, there are clearly people who move between the two.

I've never really had much of an interest in keeping an online journal, other than maybe as a convenient way to keep people up to date while I'm traveling. My wife, however, has a personal web log which is also a site for reviews about food, things we cook at home, and any other thing she decides to post about. It's actually really interesting as a way to communicate and put things out there, and every once in a while, it actually seems like people are paying attention. While she's met food critics, been invited to PR dinners, etc. because of the site, I don't think she considers herself a journalist -- not just because she doesn't get paid for her work, but also because she's not expected to follow the same standards as a journalist. Our friend who's a professional food critic will often visit a restaurant 10-12 times before writing about it (and, of course, on the paper's dime); whether the place is a hole in the wall or an expensive, Michelin starred place, our wallets and stomachs won't permit that depth of "research". On the other hand, she can visit somewhere for lunch, and post about it an hour later.

[Beebs]

It may have been mentioned upthread already, but I find it significant that as far as I'm aware, there are no bloggers' professional associations. Now, I'm not saying that anything considered a profession must have an related association, nor that one must belong to a professional association in order to be considered as such (like "real" chefs!) - but it certainly places some distinction on journalists vs bloggers.

Professional associations have codes of ethics & conduct that members must follow and are made accountable for what they do. Screw up and you get fined or suspended or have your designation stripped or otherwise disciplined. Bloggers - well, in a nutshell, they can do whatever they want and are not accountable to anybody, laws and other legal stuff notwithstanding. And yes, while it's in a blogger's best interest to be accountable to his/her readers as far as not publishing utter garbage and putting off their readers, they most definitely do not need to be.

So IMHO, professional journalists - as do doctors, realtors, lawyers, engineers, housing contractors, etc. - are willing to subscribe to certain codes & practices that go above and beyond the requirements of the state/federal laws.

[gfweb]

So IMHO, professional journalists - as do doctors, realtors, lawyers, engineers, housing contractors, etc. - are willing to subscribe to certain codes & practices that go above and beyond the requirements of the state/federal laws.

A logical approach.

But then you look at the ethics of "legitimate" journalists, like Murdoch's crew in England...

[Fat Guy]

Bloggers are subject to the same laws as all journalists, with respect to issues like defamation, invasion of privacy, copyright, trademark and patent-law violations. One of the things I tell my students is that "Once you publish your work instantly to the entire world, you're a journalist whether you think you are or not." The blogger who says, "Oh, I'm not a journalist," is nonetheless on the hook for damages if he or she commits, for example, a serious act of defamation.

Outside of the law, there are also plenty of codes of conduct for bloggers. We have one here, as do several online communities and organizations. Whether a given blogger follows one of these codes is up to the blogger. In that regard it's more like farming than medicine: anyone is automatically licensed to do it, and some do it better than others. Not that there's a license for journalists. I also think many of the professional organizations for journalists have bloggers as members. The profession, after all, is not "blogging." It's something like "sports writing," which includes those who write about sports in various media.

It may also interest some to see just how many conferences there are about blogging and social media. This is a good list: http://www.blogconferenceguide.com/

[Fat Guy]

This all reminds me that, in 2009, Benjamin Carlson writing in the Atlantic complained that blogging has become too professional: http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2009/09/the-rise-of-the-professional-blogger/7696/