Discussion today both in the higher ed section of the Oz and Crikey of recent moves in the blogosphere.
From Snitch:
IF the academic blogosphere is a revolving door, then Mark Bahnisch has just stepped out. Founder of the group blog Lavartus Prodeo, Bahnisch is that rare thing, a sociologist who writes clearly and a blogger not easily deflected from argument to personal abuse. Anyway, he’s too busy at Griffith University this semester to blog. “And it’s an appropriate season for giving things up,” he writes in his last post. “This will be my Lenten sacrifice.” Meanwhile, QUT economist Paul Frijters, whose recent HES article with Tony Beatton amounts to social scientific blasphemy in the judgment of some within the clerisy, has joined the group blog Club Troppo.
From Margaret Simons in Crikey:
Sections of the blogosphere are feeling depleted this week following two leading bloggers from opposite sides of the political fence announcing they are taking a break.
Helen Dale, previously known as Helen Darville and Helen Demidenko, the woman behind the literary scandal of the early 1990s, has in recent months re-emerged in the public sphere through the right-wing Catallaxy blog, where she writes under the pseudonym Skepticlawyer.
On Saturday she announced her departure in this post, saying:
I have not been happy with my blogging persona of late, and have formed the view that I am taking the whole exercise too seriously.
Dale cited as reasons her need to finish a novel, but also hinted at a new media gig to start in October. The hot but unconfirmed rumor in the blogosphere is that this will be a column for The Australian, where she has received favorable attention in recent times.
Meanwhile, partly spurred by Dale’s move, Mark Bahnisch of the left leaning blog Larvatus Prodeo made his own declaration, which he says is best regarded as a “sabbatical” rather than a resignation.
LP and Catallaxy are both group blogs, so will continue unabated if somewhat diminished. Bahnisch at least hopes to return once his current heavy workload eases.
Meanwhile there is growing détente across the political divide in Blog-land. The Queensland based Bahnisch, Dale and other blogging identities intend to catch up at a BrisGrogBlog this Saturday, and leading bloggers from across the political spectrum are cooperating on the “Missing Link” project, which is a useful weekly round-up of good blog posts started by Ken Parish of the centrist Club Troppo and, given the immense workload, continued by a roster of volunteers.
Blogging, it seems, is sufficient to bind people who might otherwise never converse, let alone cooperate.
In a strange way these resignations also indicate the Blogosphere is coming of age. Blogging seriously on politics and current affairs can be close to a full time job – which is why these two have had to step back from it.
The problem is, nobody outside the mainstream media has yet found a way to make it pay.
With advertising online growing fast, though, full time paid blogging can only be a matter of time.
I thought Paul Frijter’s recent HES article amounted to social science stupidity. “Social science research is plagued by people making shallow assertions unsupported by evidence and to ‘prove’ this we will now make a whole series of shallow assertions unsupported by evidence.”
They’re a weird mob, the media. Paul Collins in book reviews in the Herald last weekend sniffily observed blogging to be “a form of pooled ignorance” and then gave a positive review to book of the (Herald-produced) Sam and the City blog. Ha. Ha. Ha.
A positive review for Sam and the City!!! Wtf?
Note the backhanded compliment from the Oz – “rare thing for a sociologist”…
So will Miss Ukraine 1995 now restore the balance and write some GOOD NEWS about the real anti-red fascist AND anti-white fascist resistance in the Ukraine?
Specifically the Makhnovista army 1918-21 who fought against Trotsky and the anti-semite Grigorev?
She could also shine a light on the Leninist aggravated Southern famine of 1921 and the Leninist, famine-as-weapon, made infamous as the Holmodor. Nestor Makhno may bear some small blame for saving Lenins worthless hide… but surely demystifying this critical period with facts – well that could blow red-fascist holocaust denial wide open and destroy the Leninist myth – Helen, go for it – I dare you.
Otherwise I’ll think your an arsehole.
Kim,
I’ve just put The Australian’s Chris Merritt onto this piece – hope you don’t mind. If he has any questions I’m sure he’ll raise them in the comments.
Prof. Rat – while we could indeed have a debate about the Maknovistas, it’s probably off topic for a thread about blogging and please try not to personalise the comments.
Sam and the City is the best thing that’s happened for feminism in Australia.
However so?
Booo. That’s a disgraceful fate we ought all do our best to avoid. What are the magic words again?
“Sophie Masson”?
The mention of those two words is guarenteed to lead to at the very least, renewed cold war!
“Comments Policy”.
“Kevin Donnelly”.
Ok, I just looked at Sam and the City. Five minutes top told me all I need to know.
Strong women, in fact, most women, scare a certain sort of man. Good message.
Suck it up, Andy Pandy.
“How Shit Catallaxy Is These Days”.
“Graeme Bird”.
Soft target! C’mon, Kim, you’re not trying anymore.
“Greens/Labor Preferences”.
“Gold standard”.
“How Much LP Has Gotten All Self-Righteous Since It Got Collective Ownership”.
Now if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got a bottle of red wine to finish, my amazing supervisor to idolise, and a DVD of Ghost to watch before I go for a walk on the beach.
Bananas.
Righteoh.
“Just James”.
“Evil Pundit”
“meta-blogging”
“(Insert name here) snarks…”
“Jumping the shark”
“Cultural Wets”
“Last superpower”
Kim,
Margaret Simons of Crikey is only partly right about the Kingdom of weBlog coming of age ……not just yet though ….. but it was helped to grow up by the incredible efforts and tenacity of people like Mark Bahnisch, Helen Dale ….. and David Tiley too [his eclectic "Barista" is always worth a visit].
Blogging prospers in Australia, in part, because of all the restrictions on and in the mainstream media ….. so-called “news” now consists of celebrity stunts, unbelievable media releases, advertorials, l.c.d. entertainment and wham-bam-thank-you-mam glimpses of major disasters; analysis is usually just the gift-wrapping on even more advertorials; letters-to-the-editor have become merely hoardings for spin-doctors interspersed with modified letters from a very few ordinary readers as padding.
Anyone seeking to find out what is actually happening in the world is drawn to the internet and thence to blogging. There are all the risks of inaccuracy and downright lying on blogs but then again these risks exist in the mainstream media too [though usually better written].
Blogs, despite their faults, often give a far better and more concise oversight or analysis of a wider range of issues than ever does the mainstream media nowadays.
Not quite – that’ll get a few indignant swipes and that’s all (well, until the day after any election, when all hell breaks loose). However, fire up “Greens preferences against Labor Left MPs” (also known as “Why do the Greens only preference to dodgy Labor Right MPs?”), stand back and drop your visor…
Yes, David is a gem, Graham.
Sophie Masson? can someone link me to the “cold war” info; she came to my place for dinner, not exactly invited, years ago, however I will reserve any comment until I gain some information.. Just curious , of course..
“Islamic Feminism”.
\”Buffy sucks\”
“objectively pro-lipsniger”
Trackback. What I’m really doing in September (it ain’t a column for the Oz).
i wish people would stop defining the blogosphere in terms of the MSM or using the MSM as some half-arsed measure of the ‘media’. are you people stuck in the 1980s or what? yes, I am talking about YOU people.
all this “coming of age” talk really annoys the hell out of me. what it appears people are actually saying is that blogging practice has almost become completely incorporated into the already existing media apparatus. this is a complete tragedy. if you want to break into the MSM then bugger off and do so, don’t suck blogging down (or up) into the nether regions of your dank, dark little places where your respective heads reside in the process.
blogging should not be measured according to the expectations of the MSM. not because this is somehow unfair to compare little blogging to big MSM, but because it is an injustice to limit the potential of blogging with the stupidity of the MSM. MSM ‘blogs’ seem to be designed as quasi-newspaper-columns that elicit knee-jerk posturings of the unthinking hordes. It is one expectation unfolding in battle against another expectation. pure expectation.
the best blogs are the ones that capture the contingencies of social life before they are subsumed into the meta-level discursive apparatus of a politically complicit neoliberal MSM. The worst blogs are the ones that parrot the ‘commentary’ role of media observers and dress opinion up in unsophisticated expectation like underage drinkers out for a night on the town. it would be an absolute nightmare if the best bloggers were somehow contrived through payment to become commentary-parrots.
The way that story percolated around the MSM was kinda classic, Glen – you’d enjoy the (Deleuzian) irony!
“the best blogs are the ones that capture the contingencies of social life before they are subsumed into the meta-level discursive apparatus of a politically complicit neoliberal MSM. The worst blogs are the ones that parrot the ‘commentary’ role of media observers…”
Didn’t Yeats say this first somewhere? Isn’t it in “The Second Coming”?
“The best capture the contingencies of social life
Before they are subsumed into the meta-level
Discursive apparatus, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.
Surely some revelation is at hand…”
Aux armes, les enfants!
Congrats, SL!
Thanks Mark. Now don’t you be letting that teaching load get you down, hear!
Surviving, thanks, SL! I’ve decided to a bit of weekend blogging this weekend since I thought I’d avoid the socialising altogether to have a restful time before the working week starts again…
I’m hoping my news gets around the place as much as possible. I was completely flummoxed when the columnist story arrived at the law courts complex. Personally I think the BCL is much groovier than writing for the MSM!
Yep! A lot of good things are, I suspect!
Well done, SL. Hard yakka and salad days ahead. Gaudeamus igitur.
sorry for not congratulating you, sl. I was blinded in a horizon of red mist.
well done on getting to oxford! merely through our somewhat bizarre interweb connections it makes me feel like less of a great-grand-son convict. like return of the repressd flushed down to terra nullis and all that postcolonial jazz.
however, more importantly, are you located at one of their ‘colleges’ (or is that only cambridge, i can never remember)? and does this involve any spanking fun induction ceremonies? which may not involve spanking, but is spanking fun nevertheless. cause either way, you know, you’re going back to uni so it is time to get your super sexy student freak going on. all the bad kid cool of thick-frame glasses and nervous knee-high stripey socks. plus, have you forgotten how to drink beer? perhaps you need a primer before embarking on your pedagogical journey
indeed, irony. they like producing weapon-simulacrum these MSM hacks, don’t they? and thanks j_p_z, I don’t believe my writing has yet been compared to the genius of Yeats, however this is obviously an oversight which you have now rectified. so thank you again.
Yes, well done, SL!
Thanks all. Yes, Oxford has colleges too – like Cambridge. Apparently the one I’m going to was founded in the 13th century. I just hope they’ve installed central heating. Don’t know about any strange initiation ceremonies. I suspect that’s the Americans. The Poms probably just toss you in the Isis or something.
‘Weapons-grade simulacrum’. Very good, Glen. So good I’m borrowing it until further notice!
We don’t need no stinkin’ badges!