The Old Guard “Disses” the Vanguard
The marsupial master of miniscule, skippy, responds to a Wall Street Journal article but allowed this statement to go unchallenged: “… there is no exam to pass or society to join to become a blogger — anybody can set up a “web log” to publish his or her ideas…”.
There are among the “mighty handful” who drop by this corner of blogtopiaTM [skippy] some who provide technical support to computer users. I have done it long enough to have had to explain that copying a diskette does not involve a XeroxTM machine, that it is a bad idea to use a magnet to hold a diskette in place on a document stand, and “I haven’t the faintest bloody idea why you have to click on Start to shut down the computer, but that’s what Windows requires.”
To state “anyone can set up a web log” is prima facie evidence of technical ignorance. There is a certain skill level required before one can master Blogger, arguably the simplest of the blogging tools. I dare say that after 15 minutes with the WSJ technical support staff I would be able to find a large group of people at the newspaper who would never get a blog up and running on their own. That is the “exam” you must pass and that is the reason the Dean campaign hired two experienced bloggers to set up their system.
To join the “society” of bloggers requires writing something that others make the effort to find and read.
If the editors of the Wall Street Journal are so upset about blogs, they should tell their readers not to outsource jobs. That would slow the pace. They could also do some fact checking and hire better writers, but that’s probably too hard.
