Communication through the Blogoshpere

Since starting this class, and this blog, I have become interested in what other bloggers might have to say. After all, I (and everyone else not living under a rock for the past decade) have been being told by the press, from Fox to NPR, that the bloggers are starting to shape policy in both politics and business.

Having now begun to look into other meaningful blogs for the first time, I hope the above statement is untrue.

The first issue I had was trying to find blogs that I was interested in reading. There are a million of these things floating around the web, and the vast majority are horrible. Trying to separate the wheat from the chaff seemed to be more work then it was worth. Then, when you have found a blogger that can cogently string words together to actually get his or her thoughts across, you have the comments.

I am pretty much assured that the average blog commenter is a mouth breather. While I get it that folks are more vocal when they disagree, but the utter vapidity with which most commenters spew their bile through a keyboard... If your response to something that you don't like makes whatever you don't like look great, why try? I'd kind of expect this response with political bloggers, as if there is one thing that Americans like to fight online about, its politics; but I found it across the board.

I started with the political blogs, but had to stop with them after I realized they were causing my brain to start dripping out of my ears.

Then I went to tech blogs. These tended to be better on average, until you got to the commenters. Engadget, a popular tech blog that is verging towards being an e-zine, recently had to kill comments for a few days due to profanity, threats, and other garbage being offered up by its readers.

Business blogs? I tried. Talk about snoozers. Some of the investing blogs were interesting, but in the end, I really just don't trust most of the bloggers enough to invest in their top picks. The amusing part to this is that I do read Fool.com. I'm not often sure that they are better then a *good* blog a lot of the time.

Car blogs? Just... don't ever go there. I'm am a guy that tends to obsess over old cars. I have more then I can drive, in states from show ready to rusty stasis (waiting for the end of grad school). I thought I'd get a kick out of car blogs. After all, I spend several hours each week on BBS boards related to my current projects. I was _so_ wrong. I forgot how dumb kids are between the ages of 15 and 21. Who populates car blogs? Kids aged 15 to 21. After sifting through various mouth breathing trolls for an hour or so... I'm OUT!

I remembered that a friend of mine used to write for a foodie blog, so I searched that up. I was impressed. I did not feel dumber for having read it. Most of the bloggers there seemed to have a clue, and the commenters actually seemed intelligent. I found out about some places in the DC area that I'd like to try out, then next time I get the insane urge to drive 140 miles just for dinner. Stranger things have happened.

I also found blogs by a few friends. Some of them even had more then one posting. These were nice. A view into people's lives that I am simply too busy now to keep up with otherwise.

There is an issue, though. I kinda doubt that blogs pertaining to foodies and old friends are the stuff the media tells us is shaping public policy. Its the over the top political blogs and WAG investing blogs that are getting the press. If policy is being created by online idiots e-screaming at each other, then I weep for our future.