Newspaper articles/columns also blogs?

Some of the most informative and provocative "blogs" on Australian politics are written by journalists working for mainstream publications.

Their "blogs" are cut and paste from the newspapers where their work is also published.

Examples include Anabel Crabbe and Peter Hartcher from the Sydney Morning Herald and Malcolm Farr, Piers Akerman, Maralyn Parker and Sue Dunlevy from the Daily Telegraph.

By pasting articles and columns from the newspaper onto the paper's website and labelling them blogs, readers can comment on the original piece and engage in debate with the writer and other readers.

Depending on your definition of blogging, these cut and paste blogs could seem fraudulent. And it has been suggested that the only reason the media sites are providing this is to increase traffic and therefore advertising revenue to their site.

One might argue that true blogging is independant and not aligned with any organised media organisation. That was one of the points made at the seminar held at UTS on blogging. The argument was that genuine bloggers are free from the commercial and political constraints present in traditional media organisations, they can tell the truth and be trusted, for example Antony Lowenstein.

While Antony Lowenstein's work is well researched, he is not representative of bloggers in general. Bloggers and their work are as diverse as the general public - anyone can blog. Inependence does not alone give a writer credibility and make their work trustworthy.

The political blogs posted on the SMH and DT sites are open to public comment and debate by bloggers. Is that not just as legitimate as an independant writer, posting their views and inviting comment?

The ABC provides some middle ground in this debate with the construction of its site ABC Unleashed. This page on the ABC website presents "diverse and robust opinion about politics, society, belief and behaviour."

It is a form of organised blogging. The ABC have sourced "reliable and readable" bloggers. The bloggers' profiles generally reveal experts and researchers. They are not journalists and their work is not constrained by any commercial or political pressures that working for a large media organisation may present. Their work however is far more intelligent and readable than a lot of the senseless blogging I found whilst looking for a political blogger.