Sphere and loathing

When the blogosphere swims into focus for most people,
it’s usually because of some juvenile revelation that the
mainstream media, for reasons best kept to themselves,
seize on and beat up. I would rather not even dignify any
of the latest examples of this dismal genre. What I would
like to do is point out that some bloggers do first-class
journalistic work that ought to be acknowledged by the
msm: work that involves a bit of digging around and
connecting up of loose ends. Gordon Campbell, for
instance, sought to get to the bottom of the ‘$140 billion’
figure being bandied about as the supposed potential
worth of the minerals currently lying lonely, forlorn and
heartbreakingly unexploited beneath our national parks.
Campbell shows, convincingly as far as I’m concerned,
that the figure originates from a geologist with close ties
to the mining industry, which has an obvious interest in
talking up the amount. And No Right Turn used the
Official Information Act to establish just how people like
Brian Neeson are appointed to the Human Rights
Review Tribunal. No one in the msm, as far as I know,
followed those issues up to that extent. I mention it not
to diss msm journalists but because there's a risk that
the Cameron Slaters and Clint Heines of this world will
give blogging a permanently bad name with their antics,
making the blogosphere a byword for meretricious
maunderings and mouthings-off. G Campbell and N R
Turn are at the forefront of those who give the lie to that.