I don’t usually disagree with the Jester-in-Exile, but I think that some in the blogging community are taking this “blog vs. mainstream media” thing just a tad too far. What follows is a completely non-constructive “deconstruction” of the question, “What’s the point?”
Let’s frame the parameters of this “debate,” if there is any. Some months back, many bloggers – including myself – were a bit miffed at a passing comment by the esteemed journalist, Mr. Luis Teodoro, regarding the need for a “code of ethics” in blogging; that journalists should set examples for bloggers. Mr. Teodoro laid a challenge for people to exercise responsibility and accountability in blogging, no thanks to a guy named Brian Gorell who took blogging by storm, and for all intents and purposes, pissed on it. Some months back, Korina Sanchez ran a piece called “Beware of the Blog,” and the word “miffed” does not adequately capture the sentiment towards it.
At the height of this whirlwind, you had people like Tim Yap and Malu Fernandez take the side of the affirmative: yes, we need blogging ethics (I’ll leave you to detect the irony in there). Then you had scores of bloggers that take the negative: no, bloggers are not journalists, so there is no need for a code of ethics.
It could have ended there, but like every strange soap opera after “Esperanza,” it didn’t.
That could frame the debate, but when you’re in the picture, you don’t see the frame.
I don’t think that Nick gave me a spot in Filipino Voices to do some “misrepresent,” so to speak: I’m speaking for myself when I say that there’s a tendency towards taking these two completely different contexts (blogs and MSM), and forcing them to contradict. I’m speaking from a perspective of having my ass wedgied on that fence between blogging and MSM.
With all due respect, this is an issue of apples and oranges. One does not take precedence over another, which means that we cannot argue here on the basis that “the blog is better than MSM” or “MSM is better than blogs.” It’s like saying that blogs are better than newspapers because you don’t have to carry paper around, or that newspapers are better than blogs because they don’t cause eyestrain.
That apples-and-oranges issue, unfortunately, is the debate.
Like I said before, the mentality here is an “us-against-them” one. The tendency of this debate is not to highlight truths at all, but again (Marocharim in broken-record mode) to highlight the schism between two different realms of communication. For all intents and purposes, we’re just stating the obvious. In fact, a lot that has been said about MSM does apply to blogging. We have our ideologies, we have our potentials to be bribed, we sometimes don’t get our facts straight.
Is the debate pointless, then? Absolutely not; in fact, it can help us all frame what needs to be done about both blogging and MSM. Correcting errors, sharing successes, pointing out shortcomings, and exchanging advantages. It’s not about who’s better, it’s not about what’s better, it’s not about one taking advantage of another. This debate – for the lack of a better term – should be anything but an “us-against-them” one.
That’s the point. Anything beyond that is to turn this issue into a piss contest.
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well played, marocharim — but which part of my previous post was doing an “us vs. them” contrast?
all i did was ask five questions on MSM practice. :D
(but that’s an interesting brainwave. if a member of the blogosphere posts an untruthful/ unfair/ inaccurate report, what would be the corrective mechanisms? hmmm. food for thought.)
i think it may help if i clarify that my post was inspired by Gerry Kaimo’s email and his words on Carmela Fonbuena. :D
Nah, Jester: what I was playing on is the tone, so to speak.
What makes a real writer? What’s the point behind the debate, if it – at all – exists? Or lightning flashes thunder crashes, why do both parties rub salt on each other’s wounds if we’re supposed to be different media of delivering the same message?
Just implications; nothing more, nothing less.
Did I just write “wedgie?”
wait a minute, there’s a debate? :D
Jester, isn’t the ‘corrective mechanism’ Gerry Kaimo’s email? For the bloggers like Gorrell, isn’t the ‘corrective mechanism’ the press (like Korina and Malu Fernandez) and others (like Tim Yap)? Or do you have in mind something like what we have here in Singapore where certain topics (like politics, race and religion) are classified as ‘Out of Bounds’ (OB) in the interest of social harmony?
no, i’m more interested in this mechanism:
the iteration involving kaimo’s letter about fonbuena is as yet at #3 (if you wanna split hairs, you could argue that it’s at #4).
kaimo’s email is not corrective action. it’s merely reporting the error to its source.
as i’ve made reference to in my previous post, MSM quite often does not go beyond #5, and if applying up to #8 does not do so consistently.
(yes, i’m a CAPA-PDCA-ISO believer.)
Jester, the above eight step quality control process is all about minimizing variation to ensure consistent quality. That may work for firms (like Toyota) because of the nature of their business which prioritizes consistency in output. Minimizing variation is not the overriding goal of a free press (or a free blogosphere).
I suggest you look into the Open Source Computing model as an alternative to achieving quality.
so what is the goal of a free press, then, if not to be consistently fair, truthful, and accurate?
(i know agile. it’s no different.)
jester, in addition to being fair, truthful and accurate, a press also needs to be free. Anyway, i have no disagreements with you on the goals, only on how these can be achieved i.e. using an approach derived from statistical process control (your preference) versus one patterned after open source development.
The former aims to achieve quality by minimizing variation while the latter does so by maximizing the number of observers to compensate for individual blindspots. The media has more in common with software development than manufacturing consumer goods. That’s not to say that the statistical process control and open source development approaches to quality are mutually exclusive only that the latter is more compatible with the goal of keeping the press (or the blogosphere) free.
all right, cvj, show me how you’ll apply agile to make mainstream media consistently truthful, fair, and accurate. assuming, of course, that the media is free.
else, i’d be inclined to believe that you’d condone fonbuena’s treatment of kaimo.
Jester, the process is as it took place…
-> fonbuena publishes original article
-> jon references fonbuena’s article in his blog entry
-> gerry kaimo publishes email reaction
-> jester publishes reaction in support of kaimo.
-> alecks pabicko (also ‘MSM’) publishes reaction in support of kaimo and points to an earlier article.
…and so on and so forth.
BTW, from the above, you can see that the blogosphere was also unwitting party to spreading Fonbuena’s false understanding of cybersquatting in the form Jon’s FV blog entry (as Jon himself admits). Should he (or the blogger community in general) also be sanctioned to ensure fair, truthful and accurate reporting by blogs?
ah, but note that jon made an immediate erratum of the error (as contrast fonbuena, abs-cbn, and newsbreak, of at this posting time i have seen no indications of them doing so), remember?
having demonstrated good faith (by immediately posting a clarification), i think none can fault him for being misled by fonbuena’s report, don’t you? note that MSM is supposed to be factual, a medium to depend on, as opposed to the blogosphere, which is generally WIKI.
my point in applying the CAPA mechanism to sloppy MSM reportage is to ensure that erroneous reporting is eliminated, or at least minimized. as it is, the root causes (i.e., sloppy research, in this instance) are not eliminated, thereby ensuring that recurrence is guaranteed. it would be a pity if shoddy reportage becomes something we live with.
Jon’s acknowledgment of his error is just as it should be, although if you held him to the same standards of corrective and preventive action as you do the traditional media, it would have been better for Jon to have pointed out Fonbuena’s
erroneous reference to cybersquatting at the outset. He is, after all, an IT guy.
As it is, i don’t think Jon noticed the error.
Do you think Nick (as Editor of FV) should call Jon to task for republishing such erroneous info?
Do you think we should hold our Editor Nick responsible for allowing Jon to republish the same?
Do you think it’s worth our time to dwell on how to prevent Jon (and by extension Nick) from propagating a similar mistake in the future?
I don’t, because just like Sheila Coronel, i believe it is better to err on the side keeping the flow of information open with less quality control gates (and gatekeepers). Everyone of us is bound to make the same mistake and all we can do is follow Jon’s example in taking responsibility and immediately issuing an update upon discovery of such mistake.
As for Newsbreak or the other publications not issuing an errata, then it’s their loss since my view of their dependability as a supplier of information has gone down a notch. It’s also possible that their internal CAPA is slowing down the publication of the same.
Regarding your assertion that…
…I don’t agree that we should hold blogs (or wikis) to a lower standard of truthfulness.
i think we’re straying — i haven’t (yet) made the distinction on my views of CAPA vis-a-vis MSM and the blogosphere. maybe later.
that said:
well, of course not. just don’t expect blogs and wikis (“what i know is” this, remember?) to get it right the first time with the same reliability as that which MSM’s supposed to have.
(seriously. i find it rather amusing how my questions on MSM are being treated as yet another rehash of the MSM vs. blogosphere non-issue, as if asking critical questions of MSM presupposes that i’m doing so with a blogger’s hostile intent. :D )
ooh, and i forgot to point out something, cvj — you said “in addition to being fair, truthful and accurate, a press also needs to be free”? the fair, truthful, and accurate adjectives refer to how MSM is supposed to operate. the adjective free refers to the conditions within which MSM is to operate. apples and oranges.
(can’t believe i missed that. it was staring me in the face.)
you are, of course, assuming a) that Jon’s neutral quote of fonbuena would not be misconstrued, and b) that he knew that.
Jester, why should there be a distinction between the MSM and the blogosphere (of the FV-type) in terms of applicability (or inapplicability) of ‘CAPA’ when both are in the serious business of communicating information?
The attribute ‘free’ is important because, as pointed out by Richard Rorty (whom i quoted in your previous entry</a.), freedom is a prerequisite to truth. This is the reason why approaches to achieving quality that rely on minimizing variation comes into conflict with the free flow of information upon which both blogs and the MSM relies on.
sorry unclosed tag.
man, we’re straying… (not that it isn’t cute, of course heh heh)
freedom is a prerequisite to truth — no argument there.
however, yet again, freedom is the environment in which truthful, fair, and accurate reportage will take place. let me put it, yet again, this way: truthful, fair, and accurate is the *how* of the operation; freedom is the *where* of the operation.
the distinction between MSM and the blogosphere in terms of CAPA? none. that’s plain and simple fairness and courtesy. however, as you can see, jon has responded quickly…
the distinction in terms of MSM and the blogosphere in terms of communicating information? (talk about belaboring the obvious.) MSM can cover wider ground and greater depth of a broader scope (read: researchers, field reporters, beat writers, et al) and has to go directly to the source. a non-MSM blogger often has to depend on secondhand data and pretty much can be definitive only of what he knows personally. which, therefore, is presumed to have a greater degree of reliability?
why the refusal to think that quality (at least in error reduction) is a concept that shouldn’t be applied to MSM, anyhow? do you mean that we should let errors keep on occurring — is that accuracy in reporting? :D
and why do you harp on the blogging vs. MSM non-issue anyhow? yet again, let me point out that i made no such conflict in my previous post, asking only five questions. :D
(hahahahahaha)