Is Blogging Journalism?

This weekend I had the opportunity to speak on a panel of bloggers and journalists to debate the topic "Is blogging journalism". The discussion was at the Society of Professional Journalists Region 9 Conference on the University of Utah Campus.  It was a heated discussion moderated by Ben Winslow from Fox 13 News and featured: Eric Ethington from Prideinutah.com and myself vs. Jim Fisher, associate professor of journalism at the University of Utah and Don Meyers, reporter for the Salt Lake Tribune.

Right out of the gate, the journalists went on the offense to call out bloggers for not being real journalists.  The reasons, according to Don, were simple:  We do not have ethics nor standards.  But when Eric and I explained the ethics and standards we had imposed on ourselves, the journalists began to twist their own words to explain because we do not have editors we are not real journalists.   When we offered to have editors edit our work, they began to twist their words again.  Finally they said some bloggers could be journalists; however when the crowd jumped on this new revelation the quickly returned to the fact we didn't have ethics and we are lacking a publisher.

In the end it appeared because we had not journalists because we have not paid our dues as starving reporters with mean editors throwing ashtrays at our head.  The audience was clearly on our side and it was fun to be involved in such a healthy debate.  But the journalists will need to realize that blogging and traditional reporting will continue to merge until a hybrid model exists.  The old ways of becoming a journalists are changing and blogs have helped make that happen.  In my opinion, true blogging can be and is journalism.

I am reminded of this famous quote from an internal Western Union memo from 1876:

"This 'telephone' has too many shortcomings to be seriously considered as a means of communication. The device is inherently of no value to us." 

Traditional Journalists need to remember these words as blogging continues to advance. Western Union could have been the phone company but refused to adapt or move with the future.

In reality about half of what I do is journalism.  A lot of it is distribution of information and editorial writing.  But many times this blog has broken news or reported information for the people of South Ogden.  Either way I enjoy what I do and have appreciated all of your support.

Thanks to Ben Winslow for the invite, I had lots of fun.

See more from the USU blog and SPJ 9 blog (photos).

Comments welcome.

Photo from the UtahSPJ.com Website
Left to Right - Eric Ethington, Me, Don Meyers, Jim Fisher