Eamonn Fitzgerald's Rainy Day

Yes, we all had a good laugh here at Rainy Day — "I've been talking to myself" — last week as Katie Hafner made fun of bloggers over at The New York Times: "For Some, the Blogging Never Stops". Her angle on blogging as an addiction was rather tired, of course, but as it's the fate of all technological change to suffer ridicule one must smile, shrug the shoulders and carry on.

Now comes something more sensible, Mark Glaser in the Online Journalism Review, with "To Their Surprise, Bloggers Are Force for Change in Big Media". "A parody helps change a corrections policy at The New York Times. An online critic's query ends a career at the Chicago Tribune. Bloggers' scrutiny is making its mark on traditional journalism," states his intro. Meanwhile, Rachel Smolkin in the American Journalism Review goes further with "Blogs' Impact on Big Media". She describes of Glenn Reynolds, Andrew Sullivan, Josh Micah Marshall and Mickey Kaus as "moody maestros who stroke their keyboards more quietly but no less fervently than Coldplay's Chris Martin." Well, if that's the reward of addiction, I'm willing to keep taking the drug.