CORRECTIONS

“Blogging Research Wordle” by Kristina B is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

CORRECTIONS

August 5, 2003

Comments

One thing the blogosphere has over Big Media is interactivity and the resultant self-correction. In the space of a couple of minutes, I see both Kevin Drum and Glenn Reynolds posting to correct rather minor overstatements in recent posts in response to e-mails. As Glenn notes,

Now I’m not an empirical guy, but somebody should do an experiment: write the New York Times or the BBC about a headline that you think is misleading, and see if you get a response this quickly. . . .

And the point isn’t that I — or, I think, any blogger — is holding him- or herself out as better than these Big Media oufits. Rather, we wonder why they aren’t better than they are, given how many more resources they’ve got.

As he might say, indeed.

5 responses to “CORRECTIONS”

John Lemon

August 6, 2003 at 1:15 am

Is it just me or is it weird hearing a law professor say, “Now I’m not an empirical guy….”

I don’t think Ruth Bader Ginsburg is either. Yikes!
James Joyner

August 6, 2003 at 6:43 am

I thought that too. I think he just meant, “I’m not a stats guy” or “I’m too lazy to do the research for a damned blog post.”
John Lemon

August 6, 2003 at 1:02 pm

Whenever I hear someone say, “I’m not empirical” the po-mo warning bells go off in my head.

I could agree with the “stats” part, but even as a stats kind of guy, who does lots o’ qualitative stuff too, I know that empirical does not necessarily equal stats.
James Joyner

August 6, 2003 at 1:08 pm

Yeah–but that’s because you’re an empiricist:)

I think he just misspoke. He’s a conservative-libertarian Yale Law grad teaching at UT Law school. Surely, he’s not a stinkin’ postmodernist! Hell, he drives an RX-8!
John Lemon

August 6, 2003 at 1:40 pm

Ah, yes, but you should see what some of these campus radicals drive. It is very cool how inherited money can absolve you of any responsibility for your own ideas, and simultaneoulsy what it can buy. This is what I call the “Streisand Disconnect.”

—