Bloggin’ a sign of the times
When the New York Times is on board, the bandwagon is full.
Or the ship has sailed.
Whichever cliché you want to use.
Because, in the final analysis (hey, another one), blogs, even newspaper blogs, are spreading like wildfire (last one, we promise).
Nine months ago, The Spokesman- Review Sports Editor Joe Palmquist asked me to write an Inland Northwest-related sports blog full time. And, as we all know from personal experience, a lot can happen in nine months.
SportsLink has grown. My fingers have ached. Sound appears magically from time-to-time. Comments trickle in. But the links, the commentary, the news – they are there every day.
Nine months ago it seemed like we existed in a vacuum. Alone in the wilderness, trying to do something a little cutting edge – or as cutting edge as anything a 50-year-old guy from Spokane can do.
But we noticed something recently. The wilderness is starting to be clearcut. Blogs are popping up all over the newspaper landscape. On-line news, opinion, facts, thoughts; it’s all part of a newspaper’s mission with increased regularity.
Three things really opened my eyes to that fact this past couple weeks.
The Online News Association held a symposium in Seattle recently and we attended along with 100 or so Northwest journalists. The traditional ink-on-paper news gatherers were there. So were reps from the less-traditional-but-still- trusted television industry. And there were many envoys from the alien world of online-only news sources.
The gist of the day’s discussions: The world of news-gathering is changing. Duh. But where it is going and how it will get there is still under discussion. And the traditionalists don’t want to be left behind.
Every newspaper in America is deciding how to react. The S-R as well, but, actually, your little hometown news source is doing more than most. We’ve broken new ground in video, audio and just plain old reporting. And others are following.
Take the New York Times. When the gray lady starts to put on webbed stockings, you know the world has changed. And that’s happening. You want to know what’s going on with the Yankees? Check the baseball blog at the Times. How about politics, arts, wine, science? There are blogs about those as well.
And the Times isn’t alone. The Washington Post has some cutting-edge stuff. The Los Angeles Times is blogging a little – though the links, as can be expected from Hollywood, seem to lead to a lot of video from old TV shows. And the Northwest’s newspapers? They are starting to go at it with their usual coffee-fueled gusto.
That brings us to the third development that cemented my conviction the newspaper world is over the edge.
Seattle Times sports columnist Jerry Brewer began a blog this week. It’s not so much inside information about the M’s or the Supes or the Huskies – stuff readers just might have an interest in. It’s mostly about how and why he writes his columns.
When a sports columnist starts telling readers his first thought was to write about drinking in the clubhouse, then you know the industry has reached the tipping point, to use one more cliché. Such minutiae make it official. There are no secrets left.
Except one. When I sit down to write SportsLink in the morning, I’m usually drinking …