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Wednesday, May 03, 2006

Yet Another Newspaper Blog: Blue Notes

Maybe it's just me, but my innate skepticism about the recent spate of newspaper-driven blogs has ramped up this season. "Here," editors across not only Southern California, but the whole country seem to be saying. "In addition to your other writing duties, we want you to maintain a 'blog'. All the kids are doing it. We've heard they're cool. Look into it, wouldja? Starts Tuesday." Aside from the eerie resemblance to another Internet-related fad, the "World Wide Web" thing, it seems like these get started with good intentions and never really go anywhere.

With all this in mind, I (belatedly) introduce Blue Notes, the Times' essay into blogdom, an effort that brings to the fore the whole question of why a newspaper should blog in the first place. Faster reaction time? The Internet was built for that; they don't need dead trees to give us the news anymore. Sports opinion? Didn't they hire T.J. Simers and Bill Plaschke to dispense those? In their introductory post (posted Monday, by the way, so I'm not too late on this), authors Andrew and Brian Kamenetzky tell us, "we'll be using our clubhouse access to get player interviews and inside dope on the team." Ah, so more stuff that the Times couldn't hold for space reasons, like this interview with J.D. Drew, or this one with Sandy Alomar, Jr. So that's cool — I like free stuff as much as the next guy. So long as it doesn't devolve into one five-line post every three days when the writers have deadlines on their real projects, I'll be fine. Sidebar links a-comin'.

Update: I should have mentioned that it was Steve, the former proprietor of Fire Jim Tracy, posting in today's Dodger Thoughts thread (in a masterful piece about Grady Little's bullpen usage) who brought this to my attention. I think Steve's summation nails the problem I have with the newspaper blogs I've seen to date:

The times has started their dodger blog and it is written by cardinal fans. The times doesn't get it. One blogs because one cares.
Just so, and one gets the impression that, for many of these writers, this is just another assignment.

Comments:
Don't know if you're aware of it but the same brothers Kamentzky also maintain a Laker blog for the Times. And it's very good, providing additional coverage of the team not found in the paper itself. Absolutely no downside whatsoever.
 
"One blogs because one cares."

You can also blog because you're getting paid. Neither reason guarantees success or failure.

Caring is great in combination with perspective. I think that's a good formula. You need both.
 
If done right, these newspaper blogs can be interesting. Mark Tupper does one for the paper in Decatur, IL. He's the beat writer that covers the Fighting Illini, but on his blog, he can say things that don't make it into the game story. The game story is just that, a recap of what happened. On the blog side, he goes into more of why he thinks things happened the way they did. What he thought was the game's turning point. How the team looks in practice, and what we might expect to see in the next game.

Plaschke and Simers are the opinion guys, but they write about all sorts of stuff, so it's not really the same. As for game stories, if I watched the game, why do I need someone to tell me what happened? If done correctly, these can sort of fill a niche for the more involved fans.
 
The Times blog is super terrific. If you can't see that, you're a fool.
 
Such sarcasm! Maybe it really is good...
 

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