Bloggers - Read this!

You might have noticed a bit of tiredness in my posts lately with the continuing us vs. them model that blogging seems to have taken on in some circles. (Even in the case I posted about earlier today in Tulsa, where I think the paper is not being too smart, the blogger also loves to stoke the fire.)

Some people more thoughtful than I have started to pick up this thread as well. Steve Safran, a TV news director and contributor to the Lost Remote, weighs in with a piece that says, in essence, STOP!

The first thing we have to help readers understand is this: The medium is not the message. There is no such thing as a blogger ethic. A weblog is a website. A website is a blank canvas. And despite the hype, bloggers aren't all In It Together to bring down the mainstream media. (Read more ...)

And Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban calls political bloggers "the new paparazzi."

Traditional media have to stop thinking they can exist successfully in the future without developing symbiotic relationships with thoughtful blogs or similar vehicles. Bloggers have got to stop reading their press clippings and realize the public is not stupid. If the current shrillness continues, bloggers will find themselves victims of the same fate in the public eye as trad media -- irrelevance.