THE JOURNALISTIC BALANCING ACT

Today's marketplace has changed with the advent of e-commerce and global trade. Changes have been necessary, and demanded by consumers, in many industries. The media industry is no exception. Global reach is now possible for newspapers, media conglomorates and even small boutique magazines, all because of what we deem 'the world wide web'. A journalist's job has changed also as the industry now revolves and evolves around an increased reliance on immersive multimedia and digitalized content, things not deemed possible or necessary merely a decade ago. As blogging becomes the new wave of online publishing it was inevitable that journalists themselves would become involved, or tangled as some may say, in the new trend.
Blogging has provided a new frontier for 'armchair journalists' and 'real-time' communication. But it also presents problems due to its subjective quality. It seems blogging cannot be quantified as objective journalism, it escapes the realm of straight and simple reporting. Where as yesteryear an author was hidden in the background behind layers of truth and objectivity, blogging can essentially push the journalist forward infront of the reporting, as the face of the story itself. Increasingly, as The National Press Club explored in their recent National Ethics Week program, the modern day journalist is being asked to delve into the realms of blogging, but doesn't it compromise the very ethics or objectivity requirement that a journalist swears by? In a world where 'fine lines' are continually tred, shouldn't we leave blogging and personalized author content to the armchair journalist? Shouldn't we not flirt with the subjective and thus keep some semblance of 'reality' firmly entrenched in reporting? Afterall, if you stop and think about it, the media is an industry that helps make sense of our modernday, fast-moving reality.