Thursday, September 15, 2005

Enter the Blognet

What's the "blognet"?

The blognet is basically a subset of the blogosphere, which itself is rather monstrously diverse, with pretty much no limitation as to blog type or content.

The blognet is much more narrowly focussed. Its function is as a new current events medium run largely by ordinary citizens who care enough to ensure that real-world information being collected and disseminated, be it by the mainstream media (MSM) or by governments or merely by individuals, be as factual as possible.

This is a rather new concept, most famously exemplified in CBS's Dan Rather's well-known forced-by-a-caring-blogger-with-a-sharp-eye resignation from his lofty, powerful MSM post for his at-least-negligent false reporting on US President George Bush in the 2004 US Presidential election. More recently we saw American blogger "Captain Ed" thumbing his nose and publishing court-banned Gomery inquiry testimony, which created an unprecedented-for-the-governing-Liberals firestorm of disgusted condemnation from Canadians of all walks of life and political orientations. Had the Captain's reporting been left to the MSM, I surmise, the particular "banned from publication" revealations of the inquiry would most likely have been relatively downplayed and Paul Martin's Liberal Party would have escaped far less damaged than they actually did.

The blognet is a cooperative, collaborative community of amateur-but-serious citizen reporters and watchdogs. It has been demonstrated as "catching", as with a dragnet, discrepancies, omissions, lies, etc. by the "authorities" and the MSM and training the harsh spotlight of scrutiny upon them. Certainly the blognet is relatively in its infancy but growing and maturing very rapidly, with, for example, premier current events blog Small Dead Animals recently passing the one millionth site visitation since its inception in early 2004.

For the upcoming Canadian general election, I propose:

  • Intensification of scrutiny of MSM errors and evidence of bias and exposing them to the public to enhance informed decision-making on election day. The same goes for political dishonesty and dirty tricks, which need to be discouraged via exposure and discussion by as many citizens as possible. It's our right, after all.
  • Keeping within current (and very wrong) election law regarding spending on political expression, I recommend that serious bloggers actually advertise their blogsites in the MSM so that a greater number and diversity of citizens can benefit from their service to their country and their fellow citizens. It's insufficient to simply build it and expect them to come, as they'll be unaware of its existence. Advertise however you can afford. There will be some extra hits for sure, and if just a few people end up better-informed, then they may tell others about your blog and perhaps themselves even get involved too.

The leveraged power of this new medium remains hugely untapped. It's time to attach the faucet to the keg.

Stand up for Canada. Stand on guard for thee. After all it is your country too.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Another right wing numb-nut wanting to create a personal circle jerk to screech at the moon. Nothing new to see here. Move along.

Don

TonyGuitar said...

Excellent! Extending and expanding.

Exactly the sort of forward moving steps I, Redeux, Stephen, John and others have been talking about.

The advertising, in even a small inexpensive want ad, or free press ad, will certainly widen the political blogger base.

Things like this may seem obvious, but until they are printed out, they go undiscovered. Unused.

Ignore anonymous Don, There is no right / left connotation to the general expansion of numbers attracted to the comment and debate world of blogging.

I'm phoning the Buy & Sell Press today... Let's see. How about under the heading of Computers?

Canadian Sentinel said...

Must return to work, but thanx for visiting, my good people.

Later

Sentinel

TonyGuitar said...

My Bendgovernment.blogspot.com site did not show up in Google or Yahoo for quite sometime.

You have to go to Google and Yahoo and register your site.
That way you don't have to wait for the search spyders to find it.

Go to BlogsCanada.ca

search *A Few Blogging tips*
Saturday, April 16,2005

Jim Elve
=========================also,
Check the oil at:-
http://anchorpin.Redpin.com

Is the look not too bad?
What think you? 73's TG

Canadian Sentinel said...

Will do, Tony.

Anchorpin looks good. Simpler is better and easier to read, for me anyway.

Have so much to learn, including the proper html coding to do what I want. Stick around. I've some further things that must be said...