technoculture314-09

In this month's issue of Real Groove editor Duncan Greive posed some thoughts on the issue of bloggers versus traditional print journalism, particularly music journalism. Greive holds the view that while there are some genuinely insightful music blogs the vast majority are poor in quality owing to the amateur nature of contributors. Because of this, he believes that they are no replacement for the well researched work generally put out by experienced professionals, and with perhaps some bias tells the reader that such blogs can only give them so much of what they want from music writing. Personally I am on the fence on the issue, and I'm not entirely sure journalists are capable of knowing what the reader wants entirely, I even wonder if perhaps their view of this might be incomplete because of the new nature of the medium. The value of professionalism and experience versus what could be considered the voice of the people seems borderline impossible for me to judge. As Duncan points out print journalism has taken a bit of a knock from the emergence of the blog and the trend seems set to continue since the blog format is becoming a more formidable force in modern media. Given that I work alongside Duncan I should probably err on the side of quality over quantity in relation to journalism if only because it potentially threatens to out mode my profession, but I have found myself wondering if that view isn't over simplistic and perhaps even elitist. I think it is possible that blogs threaten professional journalism not simply due to the ease and relative cheapness with which the information can be accessed, but also because the opinions expressed are thought to be that of the everyman and more interactive. In essence I think traditional journalism needs to adapt rather than hope people will choose quality over quantity, but overall I'm still rather baffled by the whole issue so any thoughts and opinions would be greatly appreciated.