For a couple of weeks now, we have all been blogging fanatically about the presidential candidates, the race for the presidency, the debates and everything that comes with it. Week after week we have spilled our thoughts and feelings on this blog trying to raise questions or to convince others from our points of view. Until this class I must admit I was not a frequent blogger, not frequent at all actually. I think I kind of assumed blogging was some sort of anonymous (if you chose it to be) 'diary' writing; thoughts and feelings one wanted to share with the world without often being known for it. This class and my internship have showed me that blogging, just as everything else in life, is not to be simply defined in one way; it can come in a lot of different forms and sizes. What may be a diary for one person may be a paid job for the other one. As I have witnessed first hand during the first presidential debate, bloggers are not only everyday ordinary people; it has become a way of work for this generation’ journalists.

My internship during the debate was with two men who are part of the Freedom Forum and work for the Newseum in Washington D.C. Their role during the debate was not to cover the debate itself, but to cover the press covering the debate. They however not focused on the 'old fashioned' journalism; they focused on journalism in the 21st century: the Blog Generation. I have always known the internet has changed the media landscape and especially the way the media now cover the news. However, I limited this change to online newspapers, convergence, conglomeration, 24-hour news cycles; the ‘big terms’. I had not considered the role the internet played in the way news stories were going to be covered, until two weeks ago.

The men from the Newseum interviewed all these journalists and people from broadcasts about the way they covered the event and how they got their news. It surprised me to see that every single broadcast, news paper or news agencies had at least one blogger on their team to cover the debate as it was going on. One of the reporters who we talked to, explained that by blogging they could “make the readers see what they see, hear what they hear and feel what they feel.” She said it was “a way of making the people at home see the story behind the story.”

With blogging, as with so many things online, comes the concern for objectivity. It is something that crossed my minds several times during these interviews. I however realized that different journalists, different reporters, different news agencies use blogs in, yes, a different way. Yes, this reporter described her blogs as colorful explanations of the event. The AP-men we spoke to however were giving a simple, non-opinioned description of what was going on: they just wanted to get the news “out there” as soon as possible. Both claim to be objective, and there is credibility for both. We must however not forget that the internet has put a major threat on objective and honest reporting. It is important that we keep our eyes open and always check the source who wrote the blog before we simply assume absolute truth in that story.
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The internet has given us so many new options. It has interconnected the entire world and changed the definition of news and journalism: we are now part of the Blog Generation. In writing our blogs on this presidential election it is clear for everyone to see that these writings are not objective and can’t be considered news. They are however our opinions, our thoughts and feelings and they can be shared with the world. Our blogs are our truths and I see no threat in turning to a new page of the blogging diary.