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April 08, 2005

Thomas Jefferson on blogging

Dan Bricklin points to Chris Daly's Are Bloggers Journalists? Let's Ask Thomas Jeffeson. Here's a snippet that Dan pulls out of the article:

Common Sense and other pamphlets like it were precisely the kind of political journalism that Jefferson had in mind when he insisted on a constitutional amendment in 1790 to protect press freedom — anonymous, highly opinionated writing from diverse, independent sources. In historical terms, today's bloggers are much closer in spirit to the Revolutionary-era pamphleteers than today's giant, conglomerate mainstream media.

Both Chris' piece and Dan's discussion of it are well worth reading... [Technorati tags: blogs bricklin ChrisDaly journalism]

Posted by D. Weinberger at April 8, 2005 11:46 AM

Comments

Even before Jefferson and Common Sense, Benjamin Franklin often published letters, many under pseudonyms, to present a case or point of view.

Posted by: Larry Borsato | April 8, 2005 01:59 PM

See my debunkish take on this:

Blogging, Democratic Convention, "Pamphleteers", and Reaction

"In the 18th century, being a "pamphleteer" meant you had the comparative social position not only to engage in a life of leisure (very rare), but even the wealth to pay to have your political views distributed to others people (even rarer). A significant amount of the population wasn't even literate, or barely so. It was discussion among the upper classes, not the rabble."

Posted by: Seth Finkelstein | April 9, 2005 01:09 AM

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