Nerve Endings Firing Away

There are no rules for blogging. Probably that is the beauty of it. However, it may also be its greatest curse. Dave Pell’s Davenetics has a challenge for bloggers (the ‘serious’ ones at least):

Let’s set a new goal.

From this day forth, any blogger who is writing an entry for public consumption must either get the facts right or provide some analysis of those facts that is accurate, logical or at least makes a little sense.

This should be ‘duh’ advice and makes sense for any blogger worth his salt. Blogging tries to brand itself as the new journalism but often fails to live up to the standards of traditional journalism. I have never believed that blogging can replace mainstream media but it sure can act as a watch dog – Chihuahua-like, if you please — to the ‘other’ media. Bloggers can reach place, research facts, and form an effective campaign in ways much better than the ‘other’ media if they genuinely intend to. For now, most of those 30 million-odd blogs are in it for fun or curiosity sake.

As Dave says, opinions may not matter but facts do. Google your factual evidence just once before you use them. Whatever you follow it up is your wish. You’ll be judged by your opinions anyway. But getting facts wrong is generally a serious problem. But even if you do get them wrong and someone points it out to you, it doesn’t make you a weak blogger to go ahead and make changes. You aren’t expected to know everything. That’s what your readers are for.