All entries for Monday 17 May 2004

Blogging and emergent editorial forces

Writing about an entry you don't have permission to view

Big neo-con claims about blogging and degradation of society:

The Fast-Food nation has a culture whose mantra is instant gratification. You can easily buy, eat watch anything, anytime. Similarly the blog has given anyone the power to easily publish anything, anytime. As the former trivialises shopping and food, the latter degrades the quality of content. It is no longer edited, it is published as soon as it is written.

The point that is missed is that blogging has also given anyone the power to read, assess, discard, and when necessary comment (or trackback). The effect being that editorial power becomes distributed out to the reader themselves. Value emerges from the activities of many individuals in bringing blog entries to the surface. As such textual production, cultural production, is no longer controlled at a single editorial point, but is released to persue unpredictable and non-deterministic channels.

You can of course do with this entry as you please.

Robert O'Toole : 17 May 2004 21:07 |  Comments (4) |  Close comments |  Report a problem