From the NYT Editorial Page: As bloggers become more influential, they need to become more accountable. With the ascent of blogging there exist no established guidelines for reporting, though bloggers have repeatedly and successfully called attention to the mainstream media's failures to follow its own standards.

Bloggers may need to institutionalize ethics policies to avoid charges of hypocrisy. But the real reason for an ethical upgrade is that it is the right way to do journalism, online or offline. As blogs grow in readers and influence, bloggers should realize that if they want to reform the American media, that is going to have to include reforming themselves.

I think first we need to recognize that anyone who puts out information for public consumption is accountable for what they say. Whether engaged in personal conversation, writing in a public journal, distributing a pamphlet, or reporting on a newscast, we all have a responsibility to be fair, honest, and accurate. It is, of course, easier to institutionalize ethical policies when working in an organized environment, as we have with the MSM, but lack of organization does excuse individuals from responsibilities.

The Editorial calls for organization amongst bloggers and the plea for institutionalized ethical policies. No doubt the NYT would like to include bloggers in the MSM so that they have better defined adversaries who must play by the same rules and face the same economic and social pressures. But the real advantage of the bloggers is that they are not organized and are thus free to explore stories and offer opinions that are not subject to the same pressures of the MSM. The diversity within the blogosphere and the independence of the bloggers is an asset and should be encouraged. Of course, we might find convergence to conformity over time, especially because becoming larger and more organized provides more resources for covering and analysing news information. But, until then, within the sphere there remain responsibilities to be fair, honest, and accurate. There is no reason why individual bloggers or blog communities could not acknowledge and articulate these responsibilities and post them for readers. But I would resist the call to institutionalize.

And, of course, I have still a responsibility to be a critical consumer of information.

New York Times | The Latest Rumbling in the Blogosphere: Questions About Ethics

TrackBack