Blogs are often talked about in terms of the free exchange of ideas. Those championing blogs say that they have democratized the media and given everyone a voice. How wide are the communities "created" by blogs? In the book We've Got Blog, Rebecca Blood offers this explanation of how communities pop up in the blogosphere:

The blogger, by virtue of simply writing down whatever is on his mind, will be confronted with his own thought and opinions. A community of 100 or 20 or 3 people may spring up around the public record of his thoughts. Being met with friendly voices, he may gain more confidence in his view of the world…” (13)

As Blood notes, blogs depend on "friendly voices," but how often does a blogger meet with unfriendly voices? In On Liberty, John Stuart Mill talks about the value of dissent in his discussion of the free press:

"But the peculiar evil of silencing the expression of an opinion is, that it is robbing the human race...If the opinion is right, they are deprived of the opportunity of exchanging error for truth: if wrong, they lose, what is almost as great a benefit, the clearer perception and livelier impression of truth, produced by its collision with error" (53).

Do Blogs allow for the "collision with error"? Do they allow dissenting opinions to work against one another toward truth or compromise?

As you look through some sample blogs, think about these questions:

1) Who's the audience for this blog? How do you know?

2) Who is/are the author(s)?

3) What is the focus of the blog?

4) How does the blog make visual arguments?

Some examples of political blogs:

little green footballs
BlogCritics
Talking Points Memo
Wonkette
Daily Kos
InstaPundit
The Drudge Report
NewsBusters.org
Baghdad Burning
NeoLibertian.net

Works Cited

Mill, John Stuart, et al. Mill : Texts, Commentaries. New York: W.W. Norton, 1997.

Rodzvilla, John, and Perseus Publishing. We've Got Blog : How Weblogs Are Changing Our Culture. Cambridge, MA: Perseus Pub., 2002.