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January 25, 2005

Web logs come of age as source of news

Topics: Blogosphere

Before the southern Asian tsunami hit, the PunditGuy blog was an Internet unknown. But after its owner posted video clips of waves turning buildings into splinters, the Web site's modest traffic leaped 500-fold.

Without really intending to, Bill Nienhuis, a.k.a. PunditGuy, found himself in the middle of an emerging trend in how people get news. Over the past year, these online journals have gained clout as an important source of information, occasionally beating the mainstream media.

"No one was showing these videos on television news," Nienhuis said. "I posted them online Monday night, and I didn't start seeing them on TV  --  reported as breaking news  --  until Thursday."

But it's not just the tsunami coverage. Bloggers  --  those who create the Web logs  --  broke the CBS "Memogate" story involving President Bush's National Guard service. They also fed political junkies an ample diet of campaign grist, reporting alongside veteran journalists covering the party conventions and literally dissecting Bush down to the spittle in the corner of his mouth during one of the debates.

"Every year has been the biggest year in blogs, and this year will be the same," said Dave Winer, one of the grandfathers of blogging, who now edits his own blog about technology, called Scripting News. "I don't think we've even realized their potential."

Read more...

Posted by Hyscience at January 25, 2005 4:30 AM

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