Forbes: Blogging into the Mainstream: A good thing, or a bad thing?

[DeepModem Mom]

Blogging Into The Mainstream
Louis Hau, 06.19.07

Remember when blogging was about opinionated, snarky outsiders shaking up the media and "changing the paradigm" and so on?

It looks as if the revolution is now being co-opted. Last week, The New York Times hired Brian Stelter, the 21-year-old mastermind behind MediaBistro's widely read TVNewser Web site. Last month, CBS paid $5 million--that's the number 5 followed by six zeros--to acquire the satirical financial-news video blog Wallstrip....With increasing frequency, media outlets big and small are deciding that if you can't beat 'em, buy 'em. And why not? Slammed by critics for not being Internet savvy, the moves are a natural. You get an instant audience and fresh talent steeped in a sensibility that's still evolving....

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But recruiting from the blogosphere is not without its risks--for both sides. The acquisition of blogs by big media companies can alienate the very readers they're looking to pull in. Bloggers who join the mainstream press trade freedom for a steady paycheck but could get swallowed up by the larger media brand.

Wonkette founder Ana Marie Cox and ex-Rocketboom anchor Amanda Congdon are good examples. Now that they're at Time.com and ABC.com, respectively, neither enjoys the same high profile as during her original blogging gig. It's hard to shake the impression that the traditional media banners for which they now work have blunted their insurgent charm....

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(Brian) Stelter, who will leave behind the TVNewser brand name with Mediabistro, faces an even bigger stage at (the New York Times), despite his relative inexperience. He graduated in May from Towson University in Towson, Md., where he also edited the school newspaper....(W)hile his editors at Mediabistro were "generally hands off" with his blog entries, Stelter says he welcomes the guidance he'll get from his new employer. "I'm coming in with a lot to learn,'' Stelter says. "That's something I'm really looking forward to. What I was doing on TVNewser was journalistic, but it wasn't always journalism."...

http://www.forbes.com/ebusiness/2007/06/19/blogging-stelter-jarvis-biz-media_cx_lh_0619bloggers.html