Should blogging be taken seriously as a form of news communication? Is it not just a fad that has no legs? How can we be sure of the accuracy of the stories? Are they not cobbled together with little thought or research? Blog now and ask questions later?
Well Danny Sullivan thankfully thinks there's room for both well written blogs and the mainstream media to coexist very happily.
Danny is probably the world's leading authority on Search & Social Media.
Having sold Search Engine Watch and the Search Engine Strategies suite of conferences to Incisive Media a few years ago, he's now head of Search Engine Land, the SMX conferences and Sphinn.com, a hub for online advertisers and webmasters to meet and share tips and stories.
On his personal blog - Daggle.com - he's ignited a debate about how Blogs & Mainstream Media Can & Do Get Along in response to some US kerfuffle about some blogs starting to raise significant amounts of cash in venture capital.
It's fascinating hearing Danny talk about how he left his roots as a journalist behind, discovering the immediacy of the web and what he saw as a publishing revolution.
He agrees that perhaps bloggers don't quite go into the depth of research that mainstream or "traditional" print publications go into, but that they do provide decent enough commentary and analysis to make their thoughts worthwhile. That, coupled with the agility that writers for the web possess in being able to "go live" quickly, does make a good case for their existence and, perhaps, adds some pressure to be accurate and responsible.
Personally, I know a number of traditional journalists who are embracing the web and understand its place.
They're being trained to write articles with SEO (search engine optimisation) in mind, as their print stories will be published online too.
You can't fight the medium as it's now part of our media DNA, but I agree with Danny that there's no need for fisticuffs. The two can coexist and learn disciplines from each other.
The last place I'm going to be on a Sunday morning is in front of my laptop.
Sausages, beans, toast and coffee with a big dose of Andrew Marr and the Sunday papers will do me just fine!
It doesn't have to be all about the internet!
