April 19, 2004

BloggerCon Roundup

I wasn't quite sure what to expect from BloggerCon this weekend, but I ended up enjoying nearly every moment of it. Best of all was the realization that it appears we're on the cusp of a major moment, on several fronts, in the history of internet culture.

The first panel I attended was a discussion on the intersection of journalism and blogger, which I took great interest in as a blogger/journalist. NYU professor Jay Rosen led the discussion and it produced quite a bit of insight; I was surprised to see that more than half the people in the room described themselves as professional journalists.

Next came a look at presidential bloggers, led by Dan Gillmor, which featured a couple of the principals behind Howard Dean's Blog For America (Matt Gross and Zephyr Teachout), as well as representatives of the Kerry and Clark blogs. Aside from one guy who kept steering the discussion towards how bloggers can work to defeat Bush in November, it was mostly agreed that Dean's internet strategy will be borrowed and co-opted by candidates in the future; Kerry and Bush have already begun to.

After lunch came a symposium on international blogging led by former CNN reporter Rebecca MacKinnon, who runs a wonderful blog about North Korea. I heard all about blogging movements going on all over the world, including the astonishing statistic that there are now more than 100,000 Farsi-language blogs in Iran. Some of the most illuminating discussion was provided by Ethan Zuckerman (who blogs about Africa), while the Iranian blogger known as Hoder joined us on an on-screen IRC feed.

However, the most popular session of the day was run by Jeff Jarvis, and it was a discussion on different ways to make money from blogging. Various advertising schemes were introduced, as well as approaches such as "make yourself a media property" (that's my strategy) and being hired to blog for hire (a full list is here). Also present were way too many tech/blogging entrepeneurs to count, including the celebrated Jason Calacanis of Weblogs, Inc., with whom I chatted briefly. Jason, like Kwame Jackson, is in business with Mark Cuban; wouldn't we all like to be.

At any rate, there was enough discussion of money-making ideas that I thought for a second that it was 1998 again and everybody had a plan for instant internet wealth- let's hope this time ends better than the last go-around did. The session ended with the suggestion of a Blog Trade Association; I nominate Jeff Jarvis as its first president. After all, the building in which BloggerCon took place stands on Jarvis Street in Cambridge.

On top of all that, I got to meet some bloggers who I've been reading for awhile, including Protocols honcho Steven I. Weiss and Oliver Willis. And the famed Accordion Guy was there as well- with his accordion- and he serenaded the crowd with accordion renditions of Nine Inch Nails' "Head Like a Hole" and Outkast's "Hey Ya!"

All in all, quite an experience; there's a roundup of links to other accounts of it here.

Posted by Stephen Silver at April 19, 2004 12:46 AM
Comments

Hi, Stephen... thanks for the mention, but I am from NYU, not Columbia. Cheers.

Posted by: Jay Rosen at April 19, 2004 11:09 AM

Of course you are... I shall fix it.

Posted by: Stephen Silver at April 19, 2004 11:30 AM

You: "The first panel I attended was a discussion on the intersection of journalism and blogger, which I took great interest in as a blogger/journalist."

Capt: GET ME REWRITE!!! It’s either the intersection of "journalIST and blogger" or "journalism and bloggING." Unless, that is, you’re referring to the Google-owned publishing tool Blogger™ (big “B”, little “™”), but that would be akin to writing about the relationship between auto mechanic and socket wrench. While I’m at it, where is this “intersection” “on” which the discussion was held? Is it near Inman Square? Or are we involved in some sort of heavy venn diagram shit here…

Shhhh Brigade: Alright Captain, you’re drunk again. Shut up already. Steve here could have just written, “I attended a panel moderated by NYU professor Jay Rosen that discussed the fine, and so often blurred line between journalism and weblogging.” Or something like that. We weren’t there, but we share The Captain’s distaste for bad writing, especially from a “blogger/journalist.”

Posted by: Captain Rewrite and the Shhhh Brigade at April 20, 2004 08:19 PM
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