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Morning Open Thread: Meta Discussion |
by Jason Rosenbaum :: Filed Under Daily Briefing :: March 15th, 2008 @ 10:32 am EST
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As Josh and I are at NOI’s Blogger Training today, perhaps some folks would like to talk about the blogosphere this morning. Some issues that have already come up:
- Is anonymity for commenters and authors a good idea?
- How do you draw more people in and get them talking?
- Should you endorse specific candidates?
If any bloggers or blog readers out there have some insights you want to share, feel free to speak up!
Also, specifically for the Seminal, how do we best respond to commenters, given our desire to maintain an “independent” stance - a designation that’s obviously up for grabs in terms of definition. We’ve gotten more partisan over the last six months, I believe, but I still hope we’ve been succeeding at engaging visitors with different perspectives instead of driving them away. Still, it remains a challenge how to build a community that’s not explicitly based on some degree of ideological agreement.
Independent to me means two things:
1. We have no explicit ideology. Each author is free to bring their own ideas to the table, but The Seminal as an organization has no explicit leanings.
2. We are beyond corporate or party control. We are not officially affiliated with any of these entities, which makes us free to side with or against them depending on where they stand.
Independent to me does not mean unbiased. And of course, we expect the same of our commenters. Any viewpoints are welcome here, but don’t expect that there won’t be any discussion on those issues.
Still, we have to acknowledge that there’s a high degree of ideological cohesion among the writers here. Also, the primaries and the kickoff of senate races have increased our…sectarian identities, for lack of a better phrase. I think we still have the right to claim independent status. All I’m saying is that that makes defining our community here (given that many commenters disagree with us strongly but still come back) an interesting challenge.
I’d have to agree with that definition of independent. Individually, we may support similar ideas or causes, but we have no loyalty to a specific “party line” or corporate entity.
I admit, our “independent” status has become a bit more complicated of late, but the same can be said for forums of conversation as well. Is there a point at which bloggers cross over from representing themselves to representing a “blog” or an ideology or something larger than self and personal identity?
At The Seminal, it’s safe to say we all have opinions, but we share them because we want to, not because someone tells us to share them…even though the end result may not appear to be much different, in principle it makes a huge difference.