Has the MSM gone to the blogs over Katrina?
I posted yesterday about blogs covering Hurricane Katrina, but as I was going through some general blogging feeds today I noticed something I’ve never noticed before: the main stream media is blogging a weather event like no weather event I’ve seen before. There are literally Hurricane Katrina blogs popping up all over the place, although some are syndicated. Here’s a quick list of some, but there are probably others as well. We all know the MSM wants in on blogs, but does Katrina mark a milestone in that the MSM are now offering blogs as standard methods of reporting major events knowing that to not blog an event means that they are going to miss out on market share? Food for thought.
MSNBC, WDSU, The Times-Picayune / Nola.com, NBC6, USA Today, CNN, WSBTV to name but a few.
I’ve noticed this too, but in looking at the MSM blogs, they are a sorry lot. CNN’s had five or six entires over two days with nothing but “the wind is blowing and its raining” posts. Yawn.
To be effective, they need to post quickly, with multiple writers feeding in. You would think that CNN could get a dozen reporters blogging at the same time from a dozen different sports. Now that would be worth reading.
Lowly blogs like http://neworleans.metblogs.com/ have a better showing.