The Myth of the Parasitical Bloggers

by Glenn Greenwald
by Glenn Greenwald

Maureen Dowd's wholesale, uncredited copying of a paragraph written by Josh Marshall (an act Dowd has now admitted) – for what I yesterday called her "uncharacteristically cogent and substantive column" – highlights a point I've been meaning to make for awhile.  One of the favorite accusations that many journalists spout, especially now that they're searching for reasons why newspapers and print magazines are dying, is that bloggers and other online writers are "parasites" on their work – that their organizations bear the cost of producing content and others (bloggers and companies such as Google) then unfairly exploit it for free.

The reality has always been far more mixed than that, and the relationship far more symbiotic than parasitical.  Especially now that online traffic is such an important part of the business model of newspapers and print magazines, traffic generated by links from online venues and bloggers is of great value to them.  That's why they engage in substantial promotional activities to encourage bloggers to link to and write about what they produce.  Beyond that, it is also very common – as the Dowd/Marshall episode illustrates – for traditional media outlets and establishment journalists to use and even copy content produced online and then present it as their own, typically without credit.  Many, many reporters, television news producers and the like read online political commentary and blogs and routinely take things they find there.

Typically, the uncredited use of online commentary doesn't rise to the level of blatant copying – plagiarism – that Maureen Dowd engaged in.  It's often not even an ethical breach at all.  Instead, traditional media outlets simply take stories, ideas and research they find online and pass it off as their own.  In other words – to use their phraseology – they act parasitically on blogs by taking content and exploiting it for their benefit.

Since I read many blogs, I notice this happening quite frequently – ideas and stories that begin on blogs end up being featured by establishment media outlets with no credit.  Here's just one recent and relatively benign example of how it often works:  at the end of March, I wrote a post that ended up being featured in many places concerning the unique political courage displayed by Jim Webb in taking on the issue of criminal justice reform and the destruction wreaked by our drug laws.  The following week, I was traveling and picked up a copy of The Economist in an aiport, which featured an article hailing Jim Webb's political courage in taking on the issue of criminal justice reform and the destruction wreaked by our drug laws.

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