The Future of Blogging

April 22, 2009

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There’s an interesting post by Carolyn Elefant on Legal Blog Watch today. Assessing a recent survey which claims that 452,000 people claim that blogging is their primary source of revenue, Ms Elefant ponders the future of blogging. Citing the Wall Street Journal’s take on the phenomenon – “Not since eBay opened its doors have so many been able to sit at their computer screens and make some money, or even make a whole living” – she asks whether the number of blogs and bloggers will continue to grow in coming years.

Ms Elefant’s answer is no, for instead she sees “a move toward consolidation of quality blogs, with smaller, less-original blogs (the “me too” blogs or reference-type blogs that merely echo content from other bloggers) falling out of favor or displaced by Twitter. Though there will always be a place for small niche blogs with unique audiences, I think that opportunities to blog for profit will decline.”

Allowing for the UK’s customay lag behind the US in all things technological, the process of consolidation is already underway on our shores. Newspapers and magazines jumped on the blogging bandwagon indiscriminately some four years ago, but now only the strongest voices survive. In the personal sphere, anecdotal evidence suggests that many people initially relished the freedom of expression granted by the blogosphere, only to lose interest rapidly, whether because of hostile comments, poor readership figures or the realisation that blogging is like all writing: it takes effort, commitment and talent, and without this holy trinity it’s fairly futile.

Blogs are the 21st century version of that staple of newspaper and magazine publishing – the column. They facilitate greater interaction with the columnist, and enable up to the minute commentary (a sometimes dubious luxury), but ultimately, like columns, those written by the best in the business will prosper.  Ms Elefant is right – watch this space for consolidation, not proliferation.

 

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When a lawyer’s son is before the law

September 8, 2010

A lawyer of Swordplay’s acquaintance finds himself in a fix.

“My teenage son is to be interviewed by the local constable,” he tells us. “He is alleged to have committed an offence.”

We gasp, for such seems the appropriate response, and then ask: is it serious?

“No, it is not,” our troubled legal friend tells us. “In the great scheme of things, my son’s alleged transgression is about as de minimis as they get.”

For a split second, we wonder if said teenage son is cognisant of lawyerly terms of art such as de minimis, but rapidly conclude that the answer to this question is not a sine qua non of further discourse. And so we press on. That sounds good, we say, relatively speaking, at least.

“Yes,” says the lawyer, “but I am at a loss as to what to do with him. Do I come down hard and ground him, or do I play the liberal card, or do I find a compromise?”

That depends, we aver.

“On what?” asks our man.

On whether you would prefer to deal with your son’s alleged offence as a lawyer, or as a father, or as a father who is a lawyer, or maybe even as a lawyer who is a father.

“I see your point,” says the lawyer. And then, as if to prove that there is no cure for recidivism, he says: “The offence is, after all, de minimis.”

Without prejudice, we add.

Pictured: something out of Kafka. Now there was a man who knew about the law. And had a tough old father, too.

Max Mosley and Wayne Rooney: bedfellows?

September 6, 2010

We rarely enjoy pondering Max Mosley – the man, the sins, the legal action, what he stands for – but confess to a degree of grudging admiration for his tenacity in trying to change the law of privacy. As this story from the Independent has it, Mosley has lodged a request with the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg asking that, by law, journalists must inform the subject of a story of the private details they intend to print, prior to publication.

We suspect the motor racing man would never have thought it, but he would appear to have an unlikely bedfellow in a certain England footballer. Step forward, Wayne Rooney, who would presumably put his name to Mosley’s petition.

Pictured courtesy of NashvilleScene: some bedfellows are stranger than fiction.


Memo to Freelance Writers: return that editor’s call quickly

September 3, 2010

Woe betide those who freelance and fail to return a call.

We say this upon hearing of a normally prolific freelance journalist who picked up a voicemail from an editor at one of the nationals on Tuesday afternoon. Please call us, was the message, and it could mean just one thing – a commission.

Our hero’s habitual practice is to return such calls as soon as is reasonably practicable, as m’learned friends might put it. In practice, that would habitually mean within a couple of hours. Most atypically, and for reasons we have yet to fathom, our man failed to call back for a full 24 hours.

By then, said editor had looked elsewhere. One of our man’s competitors had the gig, an interesting piece about cricket and the law, one which might just be in The Times today and which, we assume, asks whether the Pakistan cricket team have been caught out (in the legal sense, you understand).

We make no judgement on the no ball scandal, save to say that it is a scandal, but in another sense the moral is clear: in the fast-paced world of modern media, he who hesitates is lost.

Pictured courtesy of PrintedClothing.com: a fast-selling shirt.