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If You Can't Beat 'em...
By Mike Krempasky
October 4, 2004

Today, one of the giants of the mainstream media sits humbled at the collective feet of the blogosphere. In mere hours, tens of thousands of bloggers and their readers, "sitting in....[their] pajamas," as former CBS executive Jonathan Klein so prosaically put it, unraveled a story that Dan Rather and CBS News spent (by their own account) at least five months preparing.

To an industry whose currency is credibility, this is a terrifying development indeed.

But it need not be the end of "journalism as we know it," as some have predicted. If CBS and company will just admit that they can't beat the bloggers and decide instead to join 'em, everyone can win.

Make no mistake-- they cannot beat them. The larger news organizations in the country boast a staff numbering in the hundreds. To count the experts in the blogosphere, you need to use terms like "tens of thousands." While a single publication or news network that faces questions about bias or error might be able to counter the work of any single blogger, they simply cannot resist the force of the collective expertise in the blogosphere.

Here's some advice to CBS -- and the rest of the mainstream media that might be a little nervous these days:

1) Stop sneering at us. Jonathan Klein tried it. It only makes things worse. Other journalists, blind to irony, have decried the lack of "checks and balances" or editors in the blogosphere. They are dead wrong. As Charles Johnson of littlegreenfootballs.com said, "I've actually got thousands of editors looking over my shoulder." Showing these bloggers and their readers (many of whom boast more advanced degrees and subject-matter expertise than the newsroom of the New York Times) a little respect would go a long way.

2) Start reading blogs. They provide the perfect opportunity for your organization to keep its ear to the virtual ground and get out of your newsroom's bubble. Not only will you be able to head off disasters like Rathergate, you can use it as a resource for your news reporting. One of the best direct mail copyrighters I've ever met made her career by sitting in a Red Lobster several times a week, just to get a feel for what the average American thought important enough to discuss over dinner. Bloggers can help as well as hurt you.

3) Allow and encourage your employees to write their own blogs. Don't just limit this to your reporting staff: let a thousand flowers bloom. Take a lesson from companies like Apple and Microsoft who push their employees to blog and thereby get instant feedback from customers, critics, vendors and clients. You'll create a culture within your organization that understands the information age zeitgeist -- and you will benefit from their insights.

4) Build your own blogs. Embrace the phenomenon officially. Use blogs to create a more comprehensive news organization unconstrained by column inches and timeslots. Your editing processes leave volumes of interesting information on the cutting room floor. Put it on a blog. Don't be afraid to give up some of your control. If the democratization of politics proved a good thing for our forefathers, so too will the democratization of information liberate and improve us -- journalist, blogger, and layperson alike.

Don't be afraid of the blogosphere. Learn from it. If you do, it will only improve the quality of your product and go a long way towards solidifying (and in some cases, re-establishing) the essential bond of trust with your readers.

And if you don't - get used to having ten thousand editors.

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Mike Krempasky is a blogger from Virginia, and creator of (Rathergate.com) as well as the co-founder of (Redstate.org)

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Note -- The opinions expressed in this column are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions, views, and/or philosophy of GOPUSA.