Based on the three features necessary to the definition of what a public sphere is, Baoill identifies the strengths and weaknesses of how public debate is structured in the social space furnished by blogs.
The second feature: Rank
The Regents of the University of California. "Professor and blogger Eugene Volokh." 8 Nov. 2005. UCLA Today. 11 Jan. 2008 <http://www.today.ucla.edu/2005/051108news_punditprof.html>.
1. Real world relationships with other bloggers – if offline relationships between bloggers affect the success a writer’s blog, all participants are not considered equal, thereby disqualifying one of the criteria of Habermas’ public sphere.
Eugene Volokh, a well-known law blogger and law professor at UCLA, said, in 2003, that:
Blogging is more of a meritocracy than many other media are, but it's still hard to get noticed, even if your material is very good. My co-conspirators and I had an edge: We know quite a few of the big guns personally, and our academic credentials give us extra credibility.
In Eugene Volokh’s case, outside rank, the reputation that a contributor has built elsewhere, became a factor (an “edge” in Volokh’s case) in the public sphere (the blogosphere).
“Blogrolls (permanent lists of links on their front pages) [ensure] improved ranking on Google and blog-specific indexes such as Blogdex, and may link to specific stories of yours, helping you build readership.”
Such rewards for good work on a blog do not oppose Habermas’ criterion of equal consideration of all participants, as long as rewards are based on the reputation that a blogger builds within the blogosphere. However, if a blogger gains these benefits based on outside factors, the blogosphere does not truly meet Habermas’ specified public sphere.
The blogosphere has seen the emergence of a small group of “A-list bloggers” who receive the majority of blog traffic, and “around whom much coverage of weblogs in traditional media is based (Park, 2003).”
Blogging is more of a meritocracy than many other media are, but it's still hard to get noticed, even if your material is very good. My co-conspirators and I had an edge: We know quite a few of the big guns personally, and our academic credentials give us extra credibility.
In Eugene Volokh’s case, outside rank, the reputation that a contributor has built elsewhere, became a factor (an “edge” in Volokh’s case) in the public sphere (the blogosphere).
“Blogrolls (permanent lists of links on their front pages) [ensure] improved ranking on Google and blog-specific indexes such as Blogdex, and may link to specific stories of yours, helping you build readership.”
Such rewards for good work on a blog do not oppose Habermas’ criterion of equal consideration of all participants, as long as rewards are based on the reputation that a blogger builds within the blogosphere. However, if a blogger gains these benefits based on outside factors, the blogosphere does not truly meet Habermas’ specified public sphere.
The blogosphere has seen the emergence of a small group of “A-list bloggers” who receive the majority of blog traffic, and “around whom much coverage of weblogs in traditional media is based (Park, 2003).”
"Shirky." No date. Freedom for IP. 18 Jan. 2008 <http://www.freedomforip.org/links.htm
A study in 2003 of 433 blogs showed that the top fifty blogs comprised fifty percent of in-bound links (Clay Shirky).
Possible reasons that the minority of blogs account for the majority of activity:
- Some bloggers are very active, have been involved with the development of blogging, and have been blogging for longer than others
- Inviting readers of one blog to read a friend’s blog (evidence of a pre-existing relationship) “will obviously push traffic to the new weblog that those without such contacts will not so easily receive”
- Media coverage of the A-list bloggers and thereby their blogrolls
- The problem of search engine page ranking systems – even if a site links a blog only to criticize it, a page ranking system will represent that blog as a popular one.
The page ranking system cannot understand the linker’s motive or intent behind the linking, but only the fact that the page was linked; page ranking systems “cannot in general recognize negative links.”
Blogs allow for the possibility of Habermas’ idea of equal consideration of participants; an affordance of blogs is the possibility of anonymity.
However, the increasing population of “celebrity bloggers and the intrusion of real-world networking have resulted in an intrusion of external rank in a manner that skews the involvement in, and impact on debate that an individual can have.”
Baoill, Andrew Ó. "Weblogs and the Public Sphere." Into the Blogosphere: Rhetoric, Community, and Culture of Weblogs. 11 Jan. 2008 <
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