Mashable - The Social Media Guide - Latest Comments in When Bloggers Aren’t Bloggers (smcb)

Re: When Bloggers Aren’t Bloggers (smcb)

Shane Bugbee — Wed, 03 Sep 2008 08:31:05 -0000

http://www.youtube.com/watc...

yea... they deserved it.

btw - how to spot a 'real' journalist/blogger in a riot... they're the ones holding the cameras and microphones and not sticks, bottles and weapons of opportunity - it's that simple.

Re: When Bloggers Aren’t Bloggers (smcb)

Scott — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 15:38:13 -0000

You said...
"Rather, this is a situation where a good definition of a journalist and news-based blogger would come in handy."

The thing is, you also defined this...
"their goal was not primarily to document"

This is a sensible definition. (Though I'd personally suggest that there are rare times when a reporter should get involved. E.g. Maybe stop filming the bleeding victim long enough to dress a wound if no one else is around to do so.)

Anyway, there are some purists, (often so wholly selfish and blinded outside of their perspective; be it right or left or whatever), who lack common sense.

Common sense for any large event planning demands some degree of security. Common sense, in this country anyway, also suggests wide-ranging press access. Which in these cases, either party is going to allow if only to avoid all the negative backlash. Put these together and what you get is a requirement for credentialing. We can certainly argue about whether this has been or is being well done.

But in any case, credentialing will take time. A blogger with serious journalistic intent will seek out and participate in that process. Not everyone will pass, for whatever reasons. There's only so much room and resource. This is no different then what traditional media face in a great many venues.

As to protestors vs. police? Please. Spare me. Three things are required for fire. Fuel, Oxygen, and a spark. For the metaphor, you can pick who's who here in terms of fuel/oxygen. The point is, all that's missing is a spark. And though some rookie cop may screw up and escalate something, chances are it's going to be some self-possessed jerk in the crowd. At the end of the day, those individuals have - through criminal intent and action - simply created a self-fulfilling prophesy and who's message no one sensible on either side of the argument is listening too any more.arge event planning demands some degree of security. Common sense, in this country anyway, also suggests wide-ranging press access. Which in these cases, either party is going to allow if only to avoid all the negative backlash. Put these together and what you get is a requirement for credentialing. We can certainly argue about whether this has been or is being well done.

Re: When Bloggers Aren’t Bloggers (smcb)

Brian Sherwin @ Myartspace Blo — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 13:08:54 -0000

I'll add that it does help if the blog you maintain is attached to a website with decent traffic ranking. I also try to avoid using 'blog' or 'blogger' when describing what I do. So instead I will just say that I write for Myartspace... at which point the person giving out passes will normally look the site up and I'm in. No fuss.

Re: When Bloggers Aren’t Bloggers (smcb)

Brian Sherwin @ Myartspace Blo — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 13:04:02 -0000

As a blogger I've never had any problems entering an event as a member of the press. I'm sure I will be blocked at some point, but it has not happened yet.

Re: When Bloggers Aren’t Bloggers (smcb)

Sin Jones — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 10:50:06 -0000

I was having a similar debate with an associate of mine. He carries a copy of the constitution in his pocket, and reads it like a bible. At any given chance he speaks on being aware of our rights, and exercising them. My response is always the same. It looks good on paper, but in practice - we are up against the system.

Just because we have these rights, doesn't necessarily mean we have the power in our hands to exercise them. We can tell a cop a hundred times they are violating our rights, we still wind up in the back of that cop car, and brought to the station. Having a good lawyer is key, to demonstrate to the 'justice system' that our rights are continuously violated, time and time again. "Security over Liberty" and that's just fowl, I hold this 'system' in contempt.

The system can get away with it, because people hand over their rights on a silver platter, and its common place because of interpretations of 'life' such as in this blog.

Re: When Bloggers Aren’t Bloggers (smcb)

Shane Bugbee — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 09:47:37 -0000

Laws were NOT broken in a MAJORITY of the cases.

You do remember OUR history... we're a country founded on conspiring against our oppressor.

The charge of "conspiring to start a riot" is VERY much against our first amendment rights, especially in this case.

Private property??? HA! The RNC cop patrol kept folks off of public property as well... let's see, heard them from a PUBLIC park, treat them like cattle, tell them where they can go and when??

Oh and PLEASE Show me ONE video of an officer being attacked prior to their BS - ONE.

Re: When Bloggers Aren’t Bloggers (smcb)

Mike Germano — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 09:40:36 -0000

Once again I thought this was a tech blog why does RIZZN keep covering political topic when he is more basis then FOX News?

Re: When Bloggers Aren’t Bloggers (smcb)

Shane Bugbee — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 09:32:21 -0000

http://www.youtube.com/watc...

Re: When Bloggers Aren’t Bloggers (smcb)

Duncan Riley — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 07:26:14 -0000

Mark,
there's fair call preemptive strikes, then there's killing fair process. The RNC arrests fall towards the latter. A few bad apples doesn't justify a broadscale offensive prior to any wrong doing taking place. We should always be presumed innocent until proven guilty. What we saw pre RNC was borderline fascist state, an overboard response that punished the innocent because of the presumptive future guilt of a few. We do not live in the age of the Minority Report, and god help us that we should ever get to that stage.

Re: When Bloggers Aren’t Bloggers (smcb)

Kane Cable — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 07:23:19 -0000

That girl should have moved then. Call it common sense if you like.

Re: When Bloggers Aren’t Bloggers (smcb)

Alexander Williams — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 04:44:10 -0000

Protesting is an excuse to pretend what you're doing matters so you can go home and feel self-satisfied. And a place to pick up easy chicks. Amusingly, this applies to every protest group on either side of the political divides.

Actually ACCOMPLISHING things require you stop protesting and start doing, saying, and accomplishing. But that's hard work, takes a long time and -- worst of all -- might FAIL. Even if you work hard and believe. That chance of failure is unacceptible to the Protestor; protesting ALWAYS works. You're seen, that's all you're looking at succeed at. That's the solution criterion.

And it's very, very pathetic.

Re: When Bloggers Aren’t Bloggers (smcb)

Alexander Williams — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 04:38:57 -0000

Remember, Mark, you're dealing with people who were stupid enough to speak elaborate plans for disruption and violence in public with the further intention to act on those plans. While we can all pretty much agree that just TALKING about them is perfectly hunky-dorey in a First Amendment kind of way, to them move toward their execution is as you've already mentioned, illegal. And the protection of the citizenry is, amusingly, one of the few things that we libertarians usually agree is one of the marginally useful functions of the State.

The irony is that the State is also the only thing that keeps the more hyper-vigilent of us from finding said self-defined anarchists when they disrupt our lives with their self-righteous idiocy and simply eliminating them from the breeding population by the careful and reasoned application of REAL violence. But self-awareness was never their long suit.

Pointedly, even if we allow that the term "blogger" covers us all equally, and really it should, we are not all equal in the face of the Law, insofar as some are law abiding citizens and some are criminals. When reporters commit crimes they don't cease being reporters, they're just bad reporters. Likewise with bloggers.

Re: When Bloggers Aren’t Bloggers (smcb)

Shane Bugbee — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 04:26:39 -0000

I'm not denying anything.

I have been talking far and wide with the fringe of the fringe and the scariest of the scary... to their face, in their homes, on the streets or at their squats.

I need no stinking website.

I do need answers and you only have opinions.

So, if they had inflammatory and illegal threats on their site, why did the law wait?

As a citizen, I feel a bit unsafe knowing that the folks I help employe are so incompatent as to not act on a threat in a safe and controlled situattion..

why let a fringe and violent element rub elbows with so many citizens at such a special event.

do you think they would take the same course of action, let's say I was to post on my site that I was gonna strap a bomb on and head to the super bowl?

I know they act real quick if you were to threaten the President, but their slow to act if you threaten the could be prez???

hmmmm... so, they wait until the world is watching... can you tell me why?

Re: When Bloggers Aren’t Bloggers (smcb)

Shane Bugbee — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 04:02:51 -0000

You make an argument after you're called on the misuse of the word in your BLOG.

In the original text you sure do make it seem that way.

If you understand that being an Anarchist and being criminal and or violent has ZERO to do with being an Anarchist, then why misuse the word?

You're not a 60yr old, out of touch journalist... mmmm... I mean blogger.

Re: When Bloggers Aren’t Bloggers (smcb)

Art Lindsey III — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 04:02:11 -0000

I feel like crap, so let me boil this down.

Blogging or not blogging, what we're really talking about here is acceptable behavior. No matter which side of the spectrum you're on, why be an unruly prick? The only thing protesting accomplishes is getting people arrested and/or hurt. Yet, people continue to do it as if it is a viable means of conversation.

That, by definition is insanity.

Besides. Political conventions are just parties anyway. Don't you kids like parties? Maybe you're just mad because they won't let some of you in?

Here's a tip: Turn off the bullhorn, put down the bag of feces, and take a bath. Doors tend to open, then.

Re: When Bloggers Aren’t Bloggers (smcb)

Mark "Rizzn" Hopkins — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 04:01:28 -0000

Wait, what?

It's always disheartening to realize this far into a conversation that the person you're talking to isn't grounded in reality.

Re: When Bloggers Aren’t Bloggers (smcb)

Mark "Rizzn" Hopkins — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 03:58:25 -0000

"Ignorance of the law excuses no man." - John Seldon.

I don't disagree that most of the protesters, by all the media reports I saw, were as you say good people.

Regardless, people must be held responsible for their actions. Violence is rarely justified under the eyes of the law. Certainly, the activities planned by the organizations in question fall outside the boundaries of the law.

Simply put, if you intentionally obstruct traffic, you break the law. If you 'crash' private property, you break the law. If you attack officers of the law, you're break the law.

There aren't any constitutional guarantees that give you the right to do either. This isn't an argument you're going to win, here. Laws were broken, and people were arrested.

Re: When Bloggers Aren’t Bloggers (smcb)

Shane Bugbee — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 03:54:21 -0000

man, you have got to be the wrongest of the wrong in blogger world.

read back what you wrote.

the term blog got you know where.
and you used a word with meaning (news) and poof you were treated as such.

It never had any magic, it's always been a term to marginalize.

Re: When Bloggers Aren’t Bloggers (smcb)

Shane Bugbee — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 03:48:41 -0000

You're trying to cause controversy by blogging in black and white.

Peaceful folks can be brought to violence, thats not to sat they won't regret it.

You don't NEED a license to protest or report - we're not dogs... you see, we still have a bill of RIGHTS that you seem to have misplaced.

I can and WILL blame cops, not for enforcing the law, but for breaking the law... to serve and protect, remember?

Regardless - the fact is 99% of the people who showed are good folk... they NEVER needed to be greeted with a show of military force, arrests and base intimidation tactics.

Re: When Bloggers Aren’t Bloggers (smcb)

Mark "Rizzn" Hopkins — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 03:44:29 -0000

So you're denying that the website, for a year, had plans to disrupt the convention by blocking traffic and crashing the convention?

If so, I can pull up the cached site files to prove you wrong.

Re: When Bloggers Aren’t Bloggers (smcb)

Mark "Rizzn" Hopkins — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 03:41:14 -0000

Four years ago, I used the term "blogger" with reckless abandon, mostly because it bewildered and mystified PR folks, and was a 'super-media' pass to get into any event I wanted.

Seriously. I got to hang out with Carmen Electra once because the PR guy giving credentials at the door had no clue what I meant when I said "blogger for rizzn.com"

"What's that?"

"It's an Internet news site."

"Oh, here's an all access pass."

Meanwhile, the MSM folks were out on the red carpet. It was awesome.

You're right, though. Now that every kid with a MySpace profile has a blog, the term has lost a bit of the magic.

Re: When Bloggers Aren’t Bloggers (smcb)

Shane Bugbee — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 03:36:00 -0000

no, police went after everyone and set the stage for violence.

talking about smoking a joint on line and actually doing it - way different.

so, it's ok with you if, let's say Ice-T was imprisoned for 'conspiring to start a riot' for simply writing and performing the song COP KILLER.

Re: When Bloggers Aren’t Bloggers (smcb)

Mark "Rizzn" Hopkins — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 03:33:59 -0000

I don't make the argument that all anarchists are violent.

I do make the argument that the term 'anarchist' is now inextricably linked to violence due to all the violent anarchist protests that continue to go on and have gone on for years.

Re: When Bloggers Aren’t Bloggers (smcb)

Mark "Rizzn" Hopkins — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 03:31:50 -0000

You bring up a very good point. Even the Secret Service isn't a very good judge of this. They were the folks issuing credentials to the '04 debates. Obviously, I'm not a rabble-rousing traitor to my country or anything, but prior to my coverage at the debates in 2004, my journalistic career was pretty thin.

Most of my work was either editorial-based or covering celebrity events. If I were auditing my work back then from where I sit now, I wouldn't be particularly keen on credentialing me to an event where heads of state would be, particularly since RantRadio is known to put folks on the air that have, shall we say, less than conventional viewpoints (the folks who were getting arrested in NYC at the RNC in '04 were on that station with me).

I'm not saying, at least for the purposes of this article, that their blogging work should be graded, but more that when we write stories of this nature, we should consider whether or not this person blogs for corporate, political, marketing, personal, activist or journalistic purposes.

All are valid forms of blogging, but they all carry much different meanings. It almost renders the term blogging irrelevant.

Re: When Bloggers Aren’t Bloggers (smcb)

Shane Bugbee — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 03:30:21 -0000

Dude, you continue to generalize Anarchists.
You are factually wrong.

ahhh maybe you're right - I did read on a BLOG somewhere that the NAACP always uses KFC to cater their events.