Observer is ok

The revised Observer seems ok as a read. Peter Preston still has reservations about the BBC and bloggers but what to expect? This will just continue as the print version gets smaller.

I think this bit by Blake Morrison may be about bloggers as well as a review of Reality Hunger: A Manifesto by David Shields

Every artistic movement is a bid to get closer to reality, he argues, and it's in lyric essays, prose poems and collage novels (as well as performance art, stand-up comedy, documentary film, hip-hop, rap and graffiti) that such impetus is to be found today. Key components include randomness, spontaneity, emotional urgency, literalism, rawness and self-reflexivity. A loosely defined genre, then: in fact, a genre committed to genre-busting. But a genre opposed to current fiction.

I may well include some fiction as well as links etc. Stories for OhmyNews will continue to be based on fact.

Observer and web policy

There must be more going on than we are told. Guardian sell off Manchester local paper and others. The new launch of the Observer seems to be just smaller. The Media and Business section looks like ending up as part of news. I find little explanation of this in the Media pages. Peter Preston mentions that the CEO talks of "digital disruption" but that is the full quote about what may be a strategy. Long ago on a Saturday there was a blog page in which people from the Guardian explained what they were doing. Why not bring this back? People who read the Guardain and Observer could contribute to something new. On Monday John Mulholland wrote about a "digital revolution" without explaining what the new approach had to do with it.

I still think citizen journalism is worth detailed study. So far the Observer has been even more dismissive of bloggers etc. than the Guardian. Will this change?

There are reports of declining use of MySpace. My guess is that Rupert Murdoch's constant claims for paid content are not helping. He appears not to like the stuff that is offered for free. Something similar may happen with newspaper titles that do not have a clear web presence or interactivity. Meanwhile presumably the money from the regional operation will be spent on something.