paying attention to blogs

Corey Pein has an interesting letter on Romenesko that takes issue with my and others’ contention that journalists need to pay more attention to blogs. He writes,

Arguing that we need to pay more attention to certain blogs and get on top of non-scandals like “Easongate” is a weasely way of saying that journalists should pander to reactionary sentiment. But more time spent in front of computers will not save journalism.

Well, sure. Absolutely, it won’t save journalism. But the big reason why reporters need to pay more attention to blogs is that the blogosphere seems to be on the warpath against the MSM and collecting heads! (I guess they’d say they’re on the warpath against the “lies and distorti0ns” of the mainstream press)

I’m from Massachusetts, and I vividly remember this radio commercial Northeastern ran about a decade ago advertising how their business school prepared its graduates for real-life scenarios. It asked listeners to imagine they were some corporate executive who had just learned his company was doing something shady — I think dumping chemicals. The kicker: your secretary tells you Mike Wallace is on line two — what do you do?

Now, Mike Wallace is probably not any kind of extraordinarily special human being. But he wields a fucking big megaphone, so you better believe any corporate executive would take that kinda call rather seriously. CNN made some efforts to reach out to bloggers, but they didn’t do nearly enough to head off the controversy.

Well, now the peasants have megaphones. And they’re out for blood.

Start paying attention.