Media Culpa

Bloggers weren’t named persons of the year by TIME magazine today. Small surprise, George W. Bush did it again, like he did in 2000. But of course it’s not all thumbs up for the President. As he puts it himself: “I don’t expect many short-term historians to write nice things about me.” Nuff said.

But bloggers get their piece of the pie too. TIME writes “10 things we have learned about blogs”:

– Blogging Can Get You Fired

– Bloggers Get Scoops Too

– Bloggers Keep News Alive

– Bloggers Can Be Titillating

– Bloggers Can Be Fakers

– Bloggers Make Money

– Most Bloggers Are Women

– [Presidential] Candidates Love Blogs

– Pets Have Blogs Too

– Anyone Can Do It

Leif Pagrotsky, Minister for Education and Culture today discussed blogs with Tobias Billström of the Moderate Party. Due to the story with SVT journalist Per Gudmundson who had to quit blogging, Billström had asked Pagrotsky:

> if he thought that freedom of speech does not include employees of a public service company?

> if he thinks that individual journalists employed in public service companies can not express views in public, even if they are not in direct connection to the work that they do as employees at SVT?

I listened in to the debate and to summarize briefly, Pagrotsky declined any responsibility for the conflict. These issues are regulated in collective agreements between the employer and the union, and therefore he referred to the board of SVT. In other words, in the name of impartiality, it is ok for a public service company to issue a gag order on its employees. I didn’t really expect him to say anything else.

UPDATE: Billström comments on his blog (in Swedish).

On Sunday, Time magazine will announce the magazine’s Person of the Year, which it has done since 1927. The special issue will be in newsstands on Monday. Some leading contenders are Karl Rove, George W. Bush, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi (Iraq), Mel Gibson (for The Passion of the Christ) and Michael Moore (for Fahrenheit 911). But the winner can also be a guy or a gal in pajamas – bloggers.

The magazine’s managing editor Jim Kelly gives some hints in an interview on I Want Media. “We got a lot of votes for bloggers as the Persons of the Year.”

IWM: Are bloggers leading contenders to be Persons of the Year?

Kelly: I would say that they are contenders, yes. You could name one blog and call it Blog of the Year, or name a group of people and call them Blogs of the Year. There are six or seven people who clearly have a lot of influence.

Via Micro Persuasion.