Questions for My Readers

I don't generally watch TV, but I read a lot of books (mostly scifi, with an assortment of factual stuff). The reason I think I prefer blogs to this sort of thing is the bite-sized nature.

The reason I think I prefer blogs to newspapers is that they're more relaxed - an interactive community rather than a one-way stream of knowledge. Theis also explains why I find reading a blog on, for example, evo-devo to be vastly preferable to actually cracking open a textbook - firstly because it's a lot less polished so you get far more of a feel for what the author's thinking, and secondly because if I have any questions I can actually ask them (it's a dialogue not a monologue). Interestingly, the ability to ask questions is in some ways more important than whether I do actually ask questions - it's the feeling of involvement that counts.

If I wasn't reading blogs I'd probably be on forums. Forums are a lot like blogs except that with blogs there's a bit more structure to the discussion.

I trust blogs better than other media to provide correct information as well as FULL information in the form of links (to governmental documents, for instance, or proposed legislation, transcripts of speeches, video/audio clips of what public-sphere persons said in the past compared to what they are saying today etc.).

Of course, it took a couple of years of massively reading hundreds and hundreds of blogs to figure out who is to be trusted and who not so much... There is a reason why, when there are breaking news about Iraq, people go to Juan Cole and not the Corner, on creationism to Pharyngula (and not to Dembski's blog) and several other blogs, on various legal aspects of the federal government (e.g., the Plame affair) to Firedoglake and Legal Fiction (and not to Powerline), or to blogs like Glen Greenwald's or Digby's, etc., etc. Those people bring in their real-life expertise, they have proven their reliability over and over again, and provide information and insight missing from the traditional media as well as from amateurish (or from politically "paid") blogs.

I barely ever watch TV (although I did in the run-up to the election). I do listen to the NPR as they are still, to some extent, trustworthy if one is careful and double-checks them after the show has aired. I gradually got weaned off of local newspapers as I read more and more blogs, though the online content of NYT, WaPo, some other papers (as well as local papers) is still something that I check sometimes. Usually a newspaper article is a starting point for a blogger to add to it, critique it, debunk its falsehoods, etc., so the presence of newspapers online is crucial for the whole endeavor of blogging.

Outside of politics, I read a lot of science blogs because I learn something every day and keep up with areas of science that I would probably skip. I follow a lot of carnivals because that is the best way to get introduced to new cool and good blogs.

One thing that blogs take time from is reading books. I read so much less now than three years ago. I used to read a book a week, mostly non-fiction (science) and science-fiction. Now I barely manage a dozen books a year!

I started reading blogs a couple of weeks ago. I kept hearing about the growing blogosphere, and kept thinking "who is reading all that stuff?", and had no intention of trying it myself, until they got my soft spot, when I found some links to blogs on science. I think the first one was Carl Zimmer's, and through links and carnivals my collection of bookmarks grew quite fast, with scienceblogs becoming the centerpiece. Too bad there is still little about maths in blogs.

I don't watch TV (I haven't owned one in years), and most of my reading is online, or from online sources (I usually print the text): news and opinion columns from several countries and languages, and scientific news and reviews that I get from the many (too many) journals from which I receive TOC alerts. I read books, too, in the hour before sleeping.

I like blogs because of: quick alert on new interesting stuff; opinionated comment, surprising and sometimes funny stuff mingled with the more topical, and the valuable diversity of informed opinions to be found in comments.

And, if I weren't reading blogs, I gues I should be working, for which, due to my obsessive reading of all the things I mention, I barely find the time :)

Ah, btw, I'm 33, and chilean, currently living in France. Mathematician, postdoc in a biology research lab.

I read blogs because they are a more human form of journalism, as well as being richer in content. Sure, there's opinion and bias, but that can be uncovered far more easily than in traditional journalism. Bloggers, being smaller targets, can run stories that the MSM won't touch for fear of government reprisals, or the withdrawl of advertising revenue. Plus the hypertext nature of the web means that information-gathering is more intuitive and accessable (I know whereof I speak; I work in a library!) The fact that I spend massive amounts of time at a computer may have something to do with it, but it's a bit of a 'chicken and egg' issue really.

I started blogging myself for a number of reasons; firstly as a daily writing discipline (which has rapidly become the activity that consumes all my writing time that I should be using for poetry and fiction). Secondly because I was sucked in by the sense of community, and the sense of that community's power; I love seeing the BBC run a story a few days after I've covered it! Egotist? Yeah, I guess so. Meh. ;) Given more time, I'd love to be able to run a more content rich blog of my own; VelcroCityTouristBoard suffers from a lack of time to devote to expansive posting. This is because I spend a few hours a night scouring out and posting tech/science/SF news and posting it at Futurismic, who were good enough to take an untried amateur onto the roster.

Most of my other info comes from books; I read a lot of SF (I also review novels for UK SF mag Interzone) and as much non-fiction as I have time for (which is sadly little these days). I stopped watching TV six years ago, and it was the most sensible thing I ever did in my life.

I'm a 29 year old library assistant who bailed out of a computer and electronic engineering degree course in the mid-90s to faff around in music, and who slowly ended up realising he should (and some day will) be a full-time writer. I live in a grotty city on the South coast of the UK.

I read blogs b/c mainstream media spews forth vacuity. They don't talk about what is relevant, and they don't say anything substantive. It's "he said/ she said" b.s. steady diet of nothing. Doesn't even matter what side you're on when you ain't saying anything anyway.

I mainly read science blogs, though, and that is b/c I don't have easy access to journals and such. Also, it's good to see the back-and-forth arguing over legitimate controversies among scientists. Further, the diverse analysis among bloggers from different fields of actual expertise is far more educative than the journalistic wankery in pop media.

Aside from a decreasing number of newspapers/ magazines and open-access journals, I don't bother with mainstream media. Planning to cancel the cable and send that $45/mo. to good bloggers (like yourself).

(full time service industry prole, part time student, southeast, too-damn-near 30). When not reading blogs, I'm at work. Or school. Or sleepingscrubbing parrot scat off the carpet.

I started reading blogs because I like the personal voice, and because in many cases I learn things via blogs that I might not find out otherwise. I still read newspapers (online), and I still read books, though somewhat less than I used to. I very rarely watch TV since I do not own one myself.

I started blogging myself in January, many months after I observed my daughter and my students spending so much time on LiveJournal. At first, I perceived the activity as akin to writing a diary, which never really appealed to me. After reading a few LiveJournal entries at random, and the comments, my perception changed. Rather than a secret diary, these were thoughts intended for public discussion. Then I discovered political blogs, media blogs, science blogs ...

Blogs appeal to me for two reasons. One: as a writer, it is the quickest, easiest and cheapest way to get your prose (good or bad) out there. Two: as a reader, it is quickest, easiest and cheapest way to read good writing and good commentary, while also being able to join in a dialogue about the topic being blogged. Traditional media cannot offer that immediacy.

Blogs can be biased, but unlike traditional media, that bias is not obscured. Bloggers say what it on their minds, and after reading several posts, you can get a pretty clear idea of their expertise and political/religious/professional leanings. There are so many blogs, that careful selection can usually result in a balanced set of views. Divining the bias of traditional outlets takes longer.

My other news sources are predominantly online: the BBC, the Guardian Unlimited, CNN. I listen to NPR for its superior news coverage (not soundbite coverage). I will peruse our local Gannett newspaper to keep abreast of local and state news. TV is just for entertainment. With the possible exception of PBS, network TV news coverage is just too shallow. In fact, as a former newspaper reporter myself, my opinion of the traditional media is at an all-time low. It seems no longer willing to be the "Fourth Estate," but rather a mouthpiece for the Establishment.

The blogosphere, I believe, is growing into the new Fourth Estate. As more people like me get clued into it, the more influence blogging is bound to have. Witness The Daily Kos, for example.

If I weren't reading blogs, I'm not sure what material I would have for my own blog! I still manage to read books, prepare for class, and deal with the many aspects of being a father and husband. Blogging provides a release -- it's surprisingly therapeutic, and I believe it has turned me into a more thoughtful, well informed person.

I teach high school physics in Louisville, Kentucky.

I intentionally haven't read anyone else's comments just so I could tell you exactly why I'm here and why I read blogs and write my own. Apologies if I'm redundant.

I'm a 42 y.o. PhD pharmacologist who got tired of watching news in my research area getting misrepresented, misunderstood, or sensationalized by the mainstream media and my local news outlets. I work in an unusual area that is of high interest to the general public (natural product therapeutics: both single-chemical entities like taxol and the 3 chemicals in Neosporin, but also in herbal medicines). I sit at the junction of a place that is pooh-poohed by many mainstream scientists and blindly embraced by many new-age folks who wish for herbal medicines to be cure-alls. As a pharmacy prof at a major state academic medical center, I found my students to be only partially interested in the minutiae of my main research area (an enzyme that is an anticancer drug target) but I could fill a 400-seat auditorium if I gave a public talk on herbal medicines.

So, why I blog is to give balance to the bunk that unscrupulous hucksters are pawning on websites, while I try to temper the disbelief of my bretheren who might not give natural products a chance because of their source and attendant woo-woo connotations.

Why I read blogs is to get a read on stories in the press from people who are actually technical experts in areas where I am not. With the exception of several writers at the WSJ and NYT and radio folks at NPR (esp Palca and Knox), most media outlets don't care enough about science to hire people with the technical background to comment on drug and health issues. Bloggers have the luxury of digging deeper and writing more, but I've also learned that I need to look for consistency among bloggers since many are also uncritical advocates of certain positions.

I am also not just a complainer (although I love to complain!) - I have actively sought out media opportunities to change the situation and help to educate journalism students who want to hear the scientist's side (BTW, kudos to you for doing this). I do volunteer teaching and graduate advisory board work for a medical journalism program at a major state school that is blessed with a MD journalist who chairs the program. I also willingly serve on the e-mail advisory board for ABC News Medical Unit on pharmacology issues - folks like Dr Tim Johnson and Roger Sergel have intentionally hired top-notch PhDs like Amy Malick to improve the quality of info getting onto network news and I'll do anything I can to help them.

What did I do before starting a blog in Dec 05 and reading blogs in June 05? I mostly talked with my physician wife about the issues I blog about and banged my head against the wall that the mainstream media didn't seem to get it. I was also driven by the fact that her cancer patients were misled by folks hawking supplements, some of which could interact negatively with their chemotherapy. Rather than screaming at the TV (I grew up in a NJ suburb of NYC), I decided to do something a little more proactive.

E-mail me and I can give you some more personal things I might not want to share here, mostly because of my current employer.

The time I spend reading blogs has been stolen from my 25-year-long habit of reading the science press. My subscriptions languish. For me, reading science is great FUN!

Science blogging started for me seriously during the last holiday season. I got into it by 1) doing research for writing about some environmental blogging and 2) a strong interest in the blossoming of the intelligent design movement. In both cases it was communication analysis that interested me.

I'm a writer, with a "writer's" varied assortment of careers in my background, four in all, one as a journalist, and I'm also now an artist.

Having a writer's background [two fiction-writing degrees, teaching writing to different populations, and working as a general and trade journalist] has helped a great deal in quickly assessing blog trustworthiness. Generally, I can tell by the nature of the writing in a few samples from bloggers, how trustworthy they are. It's in the rhetoric of their expression. [I had lots of practice correcting freshman compositions and editing copy.] It also helps that I restrict my blogging to science and environmental politics. There's much impressive writing among bloggers and readers both.

For complex reasons, in the last 5 years I've seen quite a lot of non-cable, non-satellite television. Broadcast TV has become irreversibly idiotic, worse than ever, and one can, I do, learn much about what afflicts the U.S. by watching TV disintegrate right before my eyes. Very unfortunately, I've been watching the same thing happen to journalism, at least the old style of media. My condolences to your grad students. I generally watch video and read everything deconstructively, it's just built into me by now. It adds multiple layers of enrichment. Sometimes that's the only thing that gets me through some of this material.

Personal stats. Physical age-- ancient compared to the science blogging crowd. Mental age -- varies, but always try to keep a significant part under 10-years-old. Location -- San Francisco. Interests -- creativity, thinking, science, politics, art, poetry, and the extraordinarily beautiful maritime landscape of the northwest coast of North America, from Monterey Bay, California to Bristol Bay, Alaska. And here's a bit more . . .

I first came across "skookum" in Alaska 25 years ago. It's a northwest coast native-American trading pidgin word that got picked up, and thus preserved, by the early white settlers. The fact that is has multiple meanings, and the differences are nuanced, makes it even more attractive. It can mean, among others, "strong" or "powerful" or "ultimate" or "impressive" or "first rate" or "cool" or the Hawaiian creole word, "ono". And its original meaning of a kind of spiritual power or presence doesn't hurt, either

My nom de net isn't about me, it's a reference to Earth. It's an expression of my continual amazement and captivation with life on this planet, of it's journey from day one. The visual beauty of the combination of this life and the physical earth, now, especially where I lived in Alaska, never gets old; it's easy for me to always have "beginner's mind" looking at it. SkookumPlanet is also a reminder, a dedication, each time I use it, why I'm choosing to spend some of my life communicating about our planet.

I considered adding an exclamation mark when I first decided to use it -- SkookumPlanet! It more accurately depicts the emotion. Even weirder, huh? Here's a translation into, more or less, current argot -- you read Carl Zimmer's "Zombie Cockroaches and Neurosurgeon Wasps" story and when you finish you say, out loud, "Awesome planet, dude!"

I read blogs to find out what real people who are smarter than me can teach me about what I want to know. My favorite blogs are Aetiology, Respectful Insolence,In the Pipeline, NHS Blog Doc, Immunoblogging, Circadania, DB's Medical Rants (my blogging inspiration) and a whole bunch of others. I like the feedback from bloggers and their readers- and not necessarily to just my questions.

I watch Desperate Housewives, House, PBS News, Reba, CBC Documentaries, Everybody Loves Raymond Jon Stewart and the guy who is on after him- and I read an average of eight non fiction books a week. ( I read extremely fast, which would be great if I could get a job that paid me for my one and only skill- LOL) I am currently studying the immune system, chimpanzees, chronic pain, politics and religion. I work with small children in an Educational setting. I have three kids, two who play hockey so we are gone an average of six times a week for three hours at a time. Thankfully it is done now. I have issues in my life that have caused me to see how important science is, and how pseudoscience can really screw things up for people. I want all the facts, not just the bits. I want to know why something works with no pissing around. What are the side effects, what are the long term implications, what are the mechanisms which make these things work. Most doctors are unable to tell me, so I find someone who can, or I find the answers myself.

Newspapers are good places to start, but most reporters suck at interpreting things properly. I read the LA Times nad New York times every day. I try to get as much information as possible from the original source. If I am unable to read the article I at least read the abstract and track back to see what else is out there on a specific topic. Sometimes I don't understand what I am reading until I have read an article using google to help me define words and terms as I go. Sometimes that still is not enough.

I blog as well, mostly as a place marker for all the information I have gathered, and also to release tension. I am in my late thirties, I live in Alberta, Canada, I am female, and I have done almost two years of University. I consider myself to be undereducated, which is why I try to learn everything I can on my own. It may not count in the real world, but when I can afford to go back to school I will have a wealth of background knowledge to draw from.

I probably spend three hours a day average on the computer reading. I watch tv while I read and write. My house is a disaster, my husband is annoyed I am sure. But the knowledge I have gained by becoming a blog junkie will eventually help me, so it is all good-

I read blogs mainly because they provide me with this kind of relaxed and friendly concept of reporting. I love the behind-the-scences stuff and that's exactly what blogs are about.

Student,India,19
I read blogs to get the personal perspective in areas I am interested. Also being very interested and impressed by the open source movement it seems the way to go .One can easily separate the useful and the useless.Given this, with blogs one can get *uncensored* veiws and besides not diluted to lowest denominator (as would happen in traditional media).
Other readings-newspapers,general news magazines,TV -occasionally.
Like the ones such as New Scientist and Physics World(read from the library).Books-varied topics.
If not reading blogs -roam more on slashdot!

I've kept a paper journal for 25 years (and I still poke at it), so keeping a blog is a natural thing for me to do. My blog is about a specific topic (my forest in the Missouri Ozarks), and I use it in part as a way to reflect and reconsider things I've discovered while in my woodsy rambles. I also get to flesh out my ambitions, frustrations, so forth, so it is a kind of therapeutic device for me, a brainstorming tool, and a bit of a planning technique. It also gives me a chance to brag about my woods (though an interesting avenue to explore about blogging is whether someone would blog if he/she thought NO ONE was reading the blog. I think I would, though I would be disappointed a bit).

What surprised me about blogging was discovering how quickly a community developed. I have regular blogs I visit just to keep up with my new friends' lives and activities. Some have nothing to do with the natural world (my primary interest), but I feel a kinship with these people nonetheless. Several of us have even exchanged gifts. I hadn't expected that.

Some blogs I read for technical information or at least as a way to keep informed about issues and topic that interest me. Other blogs I read are more close to my rural ambitions, so I read them for the chance to see how others are making it work: what succeeds, what fails, what surprised, what depresses.

I expect that blogging will evolve in the years to come. Personal podcasting, for example, seems to be a recent development. But ultimately, when you sit around the old campfire, there is generally always one who has the best stories or jokes. And i think this is what blogging is. An opportunity for people to speak to others. Heck, even shy folk like myself can be comfortable talking to others through a blog.

Science/tech/business writer for 30+ years. Both parents in journalism & PR, since childhood an on-beyond-voracious reader: news, science, history, fiction. Online since early 1980s (CompuServe, USENet).

I have about 75 blogs in an RSS reader, on a typical day dip into half of them. What they offer over and above newspapers and magazines is "accreditation by networking": I learned about them mostly via other blogs' links, and it works very much as if in a dead-tree context a respected friend had said "I think you'd like X's articles, or Y's columns."

I take the point made by other posters about community, although so far blog comment sections don't "add up" as effectively as a threaded newsreader or forum structure; no doubt some XML wizard is working to remedy that.

New to your readership. I am a 39 year old software engineer in Boise, idaho.

I do watch a little tv. Every few days.

My primary interest in blogs is 2 fold. 1) To get timely access to news, information, and most importantly, perspective that is not easily available in other mediums. I can effeciently get information about my personal hobbies, local news, national news, and education, all in a single process. 2) I find the social interaction and grassroots aspects of blogging very intriguing.

I'm a West coaster in my early 30s currently in the South working on a PhD in ornithology. I've been reading blogs daily and using them as one of my primary news sources, supplemented by NPR and print and online newspapers, since the run-up to the Iraq war, back in 2002. I originally followed primarily left-leaning political blogs - Eschaton, Talking Points Memo, Slate, Salon, etc. At the time, blogs were practically the only way to get any "reality-based" news, as most newspapers and television stations were faithfully printing administration talking points and beating the drums for war. Reading blogs provided some level of sanity - there were other people, beyond myself and my circle of friends, who could see through the ridiculousness of the talking points being repeated at that time.

I continued to find blogs to be a reliable source of information and viewpoints that were difficult to find elsewhere, even after the "mainstream media" (I hate that term, but I don't have a good alternative...) began to question the administration and the dominant viewpoints of the time. Blogs provided a sense of community, and also provided good summaries of what I felt was the important news, pulling together stories from many sources that I would never have found on my own.

In the last year, I've gradually become more discouraged about the political situation in our country, and about my ability to do anything about it, and so I've gradually decreased the amount of time I spend following the news - besides, after entering grad school, I don't have time to spend reading multiple blogs each day! Around the same time, I discovered Pharyngula, and from there other science blogs - including this one - that cover topics directly related to my fields and interests. I now regularly follow Pharyngula, the Intersection, the Panda's Thumb, and a few others to learn about new findings in fields outside of my specialty that I might otherwise not learn about, at least not for a while. Your site is right up my alley, keeping me up-to-date with bird-related stories and research. Also, as a graduate student who will be re-entering the job market in a few years, I'm interested in following your experiences as a representation of post-graduate life. I'm rooting for you!!

I watch very little TV - a little CNN at the gym, Lost, and that's about it. I occasionally scan a newspaper, occasionally visit Slate or Salon or political blogs, and of course I follow scientific journals and listservs in ecology and ornithology. What would I do with my time if I wasn't reading blogs? Probably study more, or maybe spend more time out birding, or sleeping - but to me, it's worth it.

Why do you read blogs? What is it that you get from blogs that you do not get from the media, books and email/IM? What other reading do you do (newspapers, magazines, books, etc.)? Do you also watch TV? What would you be doing with your time if you weren't reading blogs?

Not all blogs I read I read for the same reason. I think I started reading blogs for the longwinded analyses that are like reading the NYTimes' op-ed pages, only with a few million times as many writers, and with more varied themes. I have a much deeper background in forums than in blogs, so commenting attracted me almost from day one.

Other blogs, like yours, I read for the human interest angle. Some people lead interesting lives; of these, some post interesting life stories on their blogs, so that I go over and read. I've told you how I'm here for the stories about unemployment, living in New York (something I'm about to start doing in a few months), and in general what's going on in your life, rather than for the bird posts.

Now, I don't watch the news - I rarely watch TV. I read Google News at times, but in general I glean news from the blogosphere (which I should really stop doing, because it makes me ignorant of anything happening outside the US that doesn't directly affect US foreign policy).

If I weren't reading blogs, I'd probably be doing more productive things, frankly - like reading interesting books, or reading the background material that will help me in grad school, or editing my dormant novel. Or maybe I'd just find other ways to slack - it's not as if I was very productive before I discovered blogs.

I've got to admit that when I first became aware of blogs that I dismissed them as merely an online version of talk radio - everyone determined to express their opinion, often in the most obnoxious manner, and no matter how ill-informed. I've come to find, however, a number of good blogs that are almost all about science and natural history (incl. yours and your sibling SB blogs, Carl Zimmer's Loom). These provide some good commentary on current science news stories and often with much more detail than the mainstream media. But one of the main positives that I've found is the links within the blogs that refer me to other blogs or articles that I never would have come across. Thus in some ways I look at the blogs I read as "filters" or "portal sites" (akin to Arts and Letters Daily or SciTech Daily). An example from your blog would be your post on Lablit, which led me to some good reading (BTW finished "Intuition" - enjoyed it - but wasn't it based on a true story that occured in the 80's in Boston?). I also enjoy your Birds in the News posts.

I don't read any political blogs on a regular basis. As for newspapers and magazines I scan the NYT, Wash. Post, etc. for interesting news articles and subscribe to the Economist magazine.

I don't watch much TV. BBC's "Bleak House" on PBS and the late, great "Arrested Development" (nice combination, that) were the last 2 shows I made any attempt to watch on a regular basis. I do watch a lot of sports, though - baseball,BBall,football,soccer.

As for reading I do quite a bit, both fiction (incl. some SF) and nonfiction (history, science, natural history).

I'm early 30's and from Motown. I read blogs, and science blogs in particular, to get a closer sense of where the information originates from. The information is less filtered and most bloggers are very honest about where their strenths and weeknesses lie with regard to their topics.

I stil scan the online version of various print media, but they tend not to be either as informative or as transparent as most webloggers.

Hi, I'm usually just a lurker, so I'll tell you a bit about myself.
I'm a biology PhD student in Israel. 32, two kids and a husband. should be writing my thesis instead of reading blogs..
I read Haaretz newspaper if my husband leaves it in the bathroom. I read books before I go to sleep, now reading Andimion (might be spelt differently, I'm reading the Hebrew translation). See a bit of TV - there was a good comedy show last night.
I started reading blogs from a professional point of view, found some scientific blogs that might give me a clue about what other people think about the tons of work out there. But ended up reading mainly women-in-science blogs, feeling they are kind of a virtual support group, although I do not contribute much myself.

I'm a 18 year-old highschool student in America. Except I'm homeschooled so I have time to learn things, and read neat blogs like this one. I don't read blogs often at all, mostly books. But blogs tend to have more up to date information than books. I never, ever watch telvision.