Blogspeed
[Updated]
What’s the biggest single factor in determining the importance of blogging in the pending US-Iraq fearstorm...?
The speed of information flow.
A few weeks ago, doing my Intranet Communications Strategy pitch, I posited this candidate Unfamous Quotation:
As in business; so too in the news ‘business’. Only for “rate-limiting” we could substitute “success” –
Viz:
“The military...manipulated the packaging of information so as to favor television over other news media. Military briefings at allied Central Command in Riyadh and at the Joint Information Bureau in Dhahran were always televised briefings, and were broadcast live twice each day for the first two weeks of the war...
“At the same time, military censors in Saudi Arabia often delayed stories submitted by print journalists until well past home-office filing deadlines in the US, thereby rendering the stories hopelessly dated even before they were set in print.
“Thus by controlling the information through time, military authorities successfully maintained television's supportive role...The live television briefings from Saudi Arabia effectively circumvented critical journalism, and ensured the war would be portrayed in the desired manner"
(Source: Susan Jeffords and Lauren Rabinovitz. Seeing Through the Media: The Persian Gulf War. Rutgers University Press, 1994, p. 103).
Think about it.
The critical dimension in which bloggers absolutely have old media – both print and broadcast – smacked down cold is time.
It’s about blogspeed. Or more fundamentally: netspeed.
The rate of info flow directly from the news scene via the blogvines is currently exponentially faster than the rate of news dispersal via ‘traditional’ media.
Ev, Sergey and their advisors presumably chose to use a slightly more traditional Big Media outlet to break the Google-Blogger news first for very sound reasons (in this case it’s about reach).
But once Ev lit up the screen with his ‘Holy Crap’ post at the Blogosphere event – the news carried far and wide across the ‘Net way faster than it could have through regular news propagation.
There are other, more "mainstream" examples of the blogging community breaking or at least pushing news stories harder, faster and more completely than traditional media.
When majority leader Trent Lott made some offhand, implicitly racist comments in support of Dixecrat segregationist Strom Thurmond in the US Senate last December, the old media at first paid little or no attention.
Were it not for the amount of ruckus raised by blogs such as Glenn Reynolds' Instapundit and others, Lott might well have gotten away with his comments without any form of reprisal.
The fact that the “hive mind” of the blogging world suddenly became incandescent with noise about Lott’s remarks, probably had a great deal to do with Big Media sitting up and taking notice.
The ultimate outcome of this focused media attention, of course, was that Lott – a veteran Republican stalwart – was forced to resign.
And that is also why it’s so important that we get as many people in Iraq blogging as soon as possible.
Given what we know about the Pentagon’s media manipulation during Desert Storm I, we just can’t depend on old media to deliver the truth/whole truth/nothing but the truth - mini-army of ‘embedded’ frontline media or not. The embedded journalists will get to see and report on only what the Pentagon chooses.
As Jerry Garcia put it: "Somebody has to do something, and it's just incredibly pathetic that it has to be us."
Again, this is also why the Google + Blogger deal makes so much sense:
Your thoughts?
[Updated]
What’s the biggest single factor in determining the importance of blogging in the pending US-Iraq fearstorm...?
The speed of information flow.
A few weeks ago, doing my Intranet Communications Strategy pitch, I posited this candidate Unfamous Quotation:
“The speed at which information can be retrieved, distributed and acted on is the critical rate-limiting factor in any business process.”
As in business; so too in the news ‘business’. Only for “rate-limiting” we could substitute “success” –
“The speed at which information can be retrieved, distributed and acted on is the critical success factor in any news medium.”
Viz:
“The military...manipulated the packaging of information so as to favor television over other news media. Military briefings at allied Central Command in Riyadh and at the Joint Information Bureau in Dhahran were always televised briefings, and were broadcast live twice each day for the first two weeks of the war...
“At the same time, military censors in Saudi Arabia often delayed stories submitted by print journalists until well past home-office filing deadlines in the US, thereby rendering the stories hopelessly dated even before they were set in print.
“Thus by controlling the information through time, military authorities successfully maintained television's supportive role...The live television briefings from Saudi Arabia effectively circumvented critical journalism, and ensured the war would be portrayed in the desired manner"
(Source: Susan Jeffords and Lauren Rabinovitz. Seeing Through the Media: The Persian Gulf War. Rutgers University Press, 1994, p. 103).
Think about it.
The critical dimension in which bloggers absolutely have old media – both print and broadcast – smacked down cold is time.
It’s about blogspeed. Or more fundamentally: netspeed.
The rate of info flow directly from the news scene via the blogvines is currently exponentially faster than the rate of news dispersal via ‘traditional’ media.
Ev, Sergey and their advisors presumably chose to use a slightly more traditional Big Media outlet to break the Google-Blogger news first for very sound reasons (in this case it’s about reach).
But once Ev lit up the screen with his ‘Holy Crap’ post at the Blogosphere event – the news carried far and wide across the ‘Net way faster than it could have through regular news propagation.
There are other, more "mainstream" examples of the blogging community breaking or at least pushing news stories harder, faster and more completely than traditional media.
When majority leader Trent Lott made some offhand, implicitly racist comments in support of Dixecrat segregationist Strom Thurmond in the US Senate last December, the old media at first paid little or no attention.
Were it not for the amount of ruckus raised by blogs such as Glenn Reynolds' Instapundit and others, Lott might well have gotten away with his comments without any form of reprisal.
The fact that the “hive mind” of the blogging world suddenly became incandescent with noise about Lott’s remarks, probably had a great deal to do with Big Media sitting up and taking notice.
The ultimate outcome of this focused media attention, of course, was that Lott – a veteran Republican stalwart – was forced to resign.
And that is also why it’s so important that we get as many people in Iraq blogging as soon as possible.
Given what we know about the Pentagon’s media manipulation during Desert Storm I, we just can’t depend on old media to deliver the truth/whole truth/nothing but the truth - mini-army of ‘embedded’ frontline media or not. The embedded journalists will get to see and report on only what the Pentagon chooses.
As Jerry Garcia put it: "Somebody has to do something, and it's just incredibly pathetic that it has to be us."
Again, this is also why the Google + Blogger deal makes so much sense:
Google + Blogger = the new CNN
Your thoughts?
