Panel Discussion Tonight at the Koshland

For an overview on the shift from traditional to online news sources, and what kind of news people are reading online (weather, entertainment), see:

http://pewresearch.org/assets/files/trends2005-media.pdf

For an overview on who reads blogs and what kind of blogs, see:

http://www.pewinternet.org/PPF/r/144/report_display.asp

Generally speaking, most of the research shows that despite hype and hope that the Internet will reinvigorate interest in politics or science, it is the already interested and involved that read science and political content online. The general problem is one of choice. Given infinite amounts of information online, do citizens have the motivation and resources to find science-related information? The Internet, in some ways, can be compared to the magazine market. Some people read Scientific American, some people read Playboy, and some people read People. At sites like scienceblogs.com, unfortunately, you still have a rather homogenous community of like minded science enthusiasts talking to themselves.

The effects outside of the "mass public" are somewhat different. Activists can use the Internet to more effectively mobilize the already interested and involved, and blogs are certainly having an impact on journalists as sources of authority and information. For example, do a Lexis Search on "global warming" or "climate change" and "realclimate.org" and look at where that blog has an impact as a source of authority for journalists in sorting out claims.

A scientist friend of mine once talked to me about the process she went through with reporters. Usually the communication happens all at once, for instance at a conference. So there's a rush to get all the details and often they don't get them right. The motive is to get the scoop. Then after this, everyone goes their separate ways-- the reporters go back to their papers and she goes back to her research.

It seems like blogging could change this. Instead of all the querying happening all at once as a story is breaking, there is the possibility of an incremental publishing process. This allows people to share things before a full scientific paper, magazine or newspaper article gets published.

Also, a reporter can a use a blog to share things after something is published. A while ago Malcom Gladwell posted something on his blog about why he started:

In the past year I have often been asked why I don't have a blog. My answer was always that I write so much, already, that I don't have time to write anything else. But, as should be obvious, I've now changed my mind. I have come (belatedly) to the conclusion that a blog can be a very valuable supplement to my books and the writing I do for the New Yorker. What I think I'd like to do is to use this forum to elaborate and comment on and correct and amend things that I have already written. If you look on my website, on the "Blink" page, you'll see an expanded notes and bibliography, which mostly consists of copies of emails sent to me by readers. Well, I think I'd like to start posting reader comments for everything I write, and this is a perfect place for that.

http://gladwell.typepad.com/gladwellcom/2006/02/mea_culpa.html

So this sort of things fosters community with the people that the reporter is trying to cover, and with the readers themselves. A scientist or expert or whoever is more likely to give this sort of person more time and attention, because the reporter obviously cares about the right information getting out to the public.

(Just a disclaimer-- I am not a reporter or a scientist, just someone interested in new media and how information gets out to the public.)

What the NYTimes is doing with blogs and their reporters is interesting. On my old Framing Science blog, I have the following post on the matter:

http://framing-science.blogspot.com/2006/05/backstage-at-science-times-…

Matt,
I definitely agree about the polarization thing. I love it here at ScienceBlogs but we are a bit of a mutual admiration society at times. It would be good to have some conservative science pundits giving us hell from time to time....

Matt's point reflects one of the serious shortcomings of the new media information ecosystem: the balkanization as people gravitate toward narrow areas of interest. This remains one of the great strengths of mainstream media - the way, when you read the New York Times, you get a full menu of offerings that reach beyond any single reason you might have picked it up. So, for example, Andy Revkin's climate stories have the potential to reach far more people than the self-selected audience that tuned in over at RealClimate, or your blog, or mine.