PbB explores the interplay of social/interactive online media, politicians, political organizations, and interest groups - Journal - Who are Bloggers? Who Do Bloggers Represent?

Who are Bloggers? Who Do Bloggers Represent?

UPDATED: It is normal now, when a big news story breaks, that anchors will "go to the blogs," inviting bloggers on-air for comment, or taking some sort of "pulse of the blogs." In some ways, thus, blogs have taken the place of the "man-on-the-street-reacting-to-news-story" interview typically employed by television journalism. But what do we know about who blogs? Are bloggers the "people"?

This is a complicated question but one that many politicians and journalists are asking.

I will discuss the subject at length in my book, but see my short essay, ("Are Bloggers 'The People'?") in the "DOCUMENTS" section of the blog (left sidebar).

Main points and tendencies (not universalities) of the blogger profile:

1. Bloggers are not a statistical, representative, scientific cross-section of America--or the world. (Note: So it is wrong for journalists to say "let's go to the blog to hear what the people are saying." Rather go to the blogs to hear what bloggers are saying--but that might be pretty important.

2. Active "A-list" political bloggers--or at least those regularly ranked highest by existing "influence" and "popularity" metrics--in America tend to be male, higher income, higher educated. Non A-list bloggers tend to be much more diverse.

3. At the same time, a huge surge of blogging is occurring in young people, especially young women.

4. Political bloggers do fit the category of "influentials" who may very well affect other people's opinions on issues of the day.

5. Active Political bloggers tend to also be political activists--and potential voters and money-donors.

Update 1: In answer to Rebecca Blood--who, by the way, wrote of the first and one of the best books on blogging--below:

Rebecca: See my longer post ("Are Bloggers 'The People'?") on this in "Documents" section--what I think about "blacks and blogging" probably applies to women as well. We are in a flux period. Among the huge cohort of "MySpace" young bloggers I would bet females do dominate. In fact, in mass comm schools like mine, there are more females than males, as much as a 70-30 split. Among political bloggers, I think males dominate in raw numbers, and in terms of the who-is-on-top lists. That said, blogging is so young that we have no idea how each subgenre will develop, demographically or psychograhically. One thing I do hear from my female students is that the name-calling, profane trolls and personal attacks that are so much a part of political blogging turns them off. (Deborah Tannen might have something to say about that!). But...some of the toughest cookies of the bloglands out there are females: BitchPhd, Pamela (AtlasShrugged), Sister Toldjah, and so on. I agree completely that the present should not guide the past: blogging is about being out the box, and nobody should feel boxed out of blogging.

Update 2: To Elisa Camahort: Yes, if you have looked at the longer document on blogs as "the people" you will see that I completely agree that our existing measuring scales pose many problems. One for me is that quantity is not quality: there are some amazing blogs out there, that, as far as I can tell, have no audience.

Posted on Saturday, January 28, 2006 at 09:38PM by

david.d.perlmutter in Blogstyle, Political Blogger Profile |

89 Comments

Reader Comments (89)

I notice that you say that bloggers tend to be male, higher income, etc. In fact all the surveys I've seen show that bloggers are about 50% male, 50% female.

Political bloggers *may* be predominantly male, but even that is controversial. Many female political bloggers feel ignored by the male blogosphere. Linking patterns can obscure the reality: from any webpage, you can see only what is linked. Linking patterns give the impression of a left-wing, right-wing, male, female, diarist, political, or food blogger dominance depending on which weblog you happen to have landed. It takes a concerted effort to break out of the birds of a feather groups that form on the Web.

January 4, 2006 |

Rebecca Blood

I would only add to what Rebecca says by saying that if one means "the most-linked, as ranked by one existing blog search tool, political bloggers tend to be..." then that is exactly what should be said. It is a significant clarification.

Current tools for blog discovery being in even greater infancy than blogging itself, we should be attaching caveats to whatever conclusions are drawn by relying on those tools.

January 6, 2006 |

Elisa Camahort

I think this is an interesting question because when I saw the title I thought, “Well bloggers are probably a very small demographic of upper middle class young adults.” But I think it is a good point that more adults are becoming internet savvy, and the age at which kids start using the internet is getting younger and younger. Similarly blogs are used for everything from mothers posting recipes to people with PhDs’ opinions about government policy to teenagers posting diary entries on myspace. In this way I think bloggers represent a diverse group of people in America, because the internet is so central to all of our lives. Obviously America is unique in this because as an extremely wealthy nation, most people here at least have some access to a computer. The one thing that does link every American blogger, however, is that they each have opinions, and they each are willing to take the time to put them out there. I think this says that bloggers are a group of people who what to create change.

January 19, 2006 |

Speak182

I believe that male dominance over women in political blogs in very similar to the same reason that there are more men in political careers than women. Men have always been domineering in politics and probably will dominate for a very long time. I think that some women might just be shy or fearful to express their true opinion where so many can see it. I do not believe that bloggers are the “people.” I do not believe that all blogs represent the opinion of the majority of voters. I think that many bloggers might be “out-of-the-box” thinkers. I think that most people would not take the effort to write a blog if it represents the same opinion that most other Americans. Someone with a new idea or a unique opinion about something is much more in need of getting there opinion out in the open than someone who believes the same thing as most other Americans.

January 19, 2006 |

WB1

I share some of the views that WB1 expressed above -- not with the women issue really, but the concept of how bloggers represent "the people".

I've been on the internet for many, many years. Before the blog boom that we have now, people would still do the same type of information and opinion posting that bloggers do today. Back then it wasn't known as a blog, and I think people posted more because they had an actual reason to. Today, many (if not most) bloggers are posting just to post. It seems that these bloggers are saying "well if I write something I will get noticed," instead of the old mentality of "this information needs to be out there, so I will write about it."

In my view, most of the people we see today as bloggers are basically just people craving attention. What's the best way to get attention? Well, being controversial is one good way. And that is something I see a lot of today in blogs, controversy for the sake of it.

That is not a good representation of most of the populace, and thus bloggers, by and large, do not accurately represent "the people".

January 19, 2006 |

evilbadz

I agree that blogging does not accurately represent the people as a whole. Firstly,Blogging is limited to those of lower socioeconomic stability thus not providing internet accessibility. Secondly, those who are highly respected for their opinion will have more political influence on their blog subscribers. In reference to the article "Are bloggers the people?," I would say that females and minorities are underepresented in the blogosphere, and their opinions not considered as much as say an upper class white male.

January 19, 2006 |

Shea

Before reading this informatory blog, I have had little knowledge of blogs and or bloggers. I find the statistics very interesting and this has definitely caught my attention to the new “blog boom” craze. I have to agree with some that bloggers do not necessarily represent “the people” because many are out there for the sake of simply being heard and others to just be controversial. There do seem to be many Political Bloggers that fit the male, higher income, higher educated profile, but at the same time there is a tremendous increase of the blogging craze in young people recently through myspace etc. Bloggers do have the potential to influence others, but I believe they have to put something meaningful that can stir conflict and controversy among others.

January 19, 2006 |

lora2686

I didn’t know too much about blogs either before I started reading these comments. I just thought that it was like forums that people went to to complain or whine about problems in the world. I now know that they are now more than that. I think the reason that political bloggers post comments is that they either want to A) persuade someone into thinking like they do or B) They want to promote a response or action. I did notice that the number of female bloggers have increased as well. I guess the reason for that is a lot of women are affected a lot more than men by the content that is portrayed in the media. For instance, the Tag body spray commercials some women find those offensive.

January 19, 2006 |

seeker23

Ok, I must be totally honest; just like lora2626, I had never heard of blogging before. After reading these blogs, it is like I have been opened up to a whole different world. Although I do not think bloggers represent us, I think it is a great thing. This opens the door for change. Sadly, today there is important news that the media underestimates because they think that the people want to know what celebrity is divorcing who more than they want to know what is really going on in the world. Blogging is one way to get your opinion out there, but it is also a way to read about news that you might not hear about on television. In my opinion, bloggers sort of represent a voice. This has opened my eyes to the point where I will participate in blogging, after all; you never know who is reading them.

January 20, 2006 |

LoveTy

After reading and understanding more about bloggers I believe that bloggers are independent American people who have opinions that contrast or agree with every other individual in society. Bloggers represent an individual cause, or a change in the normal way of thinking or acting. Bloggers represent more than just politics, and even though they might not influence politics I think it is important for society to recognize bloggers so the bloggers can feel more uniformed and organized towards a cause. The internet is being opened up to more and more people every day, and with this, the amount of blogs will increase and maybe even the impact of blogs as well.

January 20, 2006 |

womblino

I don't believe that statistical information on blogging can be completely trusted because of the unfamiliarty of blogging to so many people. Just like the many people that have posted responses to this bloghave stated, blogging is new to so many people that it has yet to really take off. Blogging is really becoming popluar because of the anonimity that is associated with it; it provides people with an outlet for expressing their ideas without the fear of rejection. It's also a way for people of similar interets to share and receive insight on certain topics. I believe that, in the near future, we will see blogging really become popular.

January 20, 2006 |

Anonymous

According to different posts, it’s been said that men are the more common bloggers, but it’s also been said by one person they found it was closer to being an even percentage between men and women. My question is, “Where does the basis of this information come from?” The content of a website will often be the reason behind the sex and age of a person bothering to view the site, let alone comment on it. I don’t think it can be easily found as to who (whether it be female or male, old or young, etc.) dominates the blog world. Also, another question that comes to my mind is how do we know the sex or age of a blogger? It’s not always a requirement that someone post their age or sex. A blog name can’t necessarily give age or sex away. How can we truly make that determination? One final point, it’s been noted that lower income people don’t have the access to the internet to do blogging, thus blogging is not a fair representation of “everyone”. Who said it was? It seems to me that bloggers are aware of who has the ability to blog and who doesn’t. While blogs are a form of media, I haven’t heard or read anywhere that blogging is claimed to be a fair representation of “everyone“. Perhaps that is a piece of information I simply haven’t come across.

January 21, 2006 |

AndMoreToCome

Judging from what I have read so far in terms of blogs, bloggers and bloggings, it does not seem to me that these Internet sites are anything more than an individual’s written thoughts on a subject of interest to that individual who may be a political analyst or just a commentator writing about a high school band’s activity.

In another words, by posting it he invites the same kind of activity from other people of similar interests. It’s possible that motives other than that which would seem to be very innocuous are at play for the purpose of directing or influencing the thinking of other people and this perhaps can best be seen as slanting a supposed report which makes a distorted view of the event reported on when it is not, in fact, true.

Furthermore, it seems to me that we should, as intelligent people, try to ascertain what would be the purpose, or intent, of the information a blogger is blogging. And by its content better gain an understanding as to whether it is just a reported incident or if its purpose is to some how influence thinking and behavior.

January 21, 2006 |

NoName

I think it is hard to establish whether or not a blogger is female or male. No matter where the blog is ( political or personal) this is the Internet age where people can conceal their true identity. Maybe there are more men on political blogs, or maybe they are girls pretending to be men in order to get their point across with out being judged as female or male. So I really don't think there is a real sense of who is blogging and who is not.

January 22, 2006 |

froggy 16

While sitting in class, I was realizing that it was only a few weeks ago when I actually learned about a blog on MySpace.com. Since I came across blogging on MySpace, I would think the majority of bloggers would be young females. After reading this article I learned that they are white males. Most blogs that I have seen are just people’s feelings or random things such as what they did and how their day was boring. I never realized that bloggers can to try to influence others regarding politics and other subjects that are taken seriously. I think this whole blog bandwagon was just childplay.

January 22, 2006 |

gurlygurlz

I also think that it is hard to gain statistical information when it comes to blogging because of how easy it is for people to conceal their identity. And isn't that the point for some bloggers? One of the reasons that I post blogs is so that I can express my opinions and get feedback on my views without anyone knowing who I am. Blogs are also great because you can find out various viewpoints on any topic that you might be interested in. I'm really anxious to see whether blogging becomes more prevalent in people's everyday lives and the various ways that it is used in communication.

January 22, 2006 |

Diamond girl

I think there is no real way to tell if a blogger is male or female, young or old, democratic or republican, etc. because many people would rather not give their real information out. If I had to guess I would say that the percents of whether the bloggers are male or female are relatively even. I say this because males and females are so different and there are so many topics that can get blogged today.

Mainly females will go for the cooking, kids, etc. topics, while men will go for the sports, and cars. But, I think both men and women pretty much evenly blog on politics and things going on in the world today. Therefore, I think it is impossible to tell one way or the other on who blogs more, it is mere opinion.

January 22, 2006 |

TS28

Wow, I truly had no idea that blogging was such a big part of the political world. The only blogging I have ever known of was dance teams posting comments about certain people on other teams and these blogs were not so nice or positive. I am not really sure what all the hype is about blogging and why it is important about who blogs. To me it just seems to be people posing their opinions on a subject and whether the person is male, female, Caucasian, or African American everyone has their own opinion on the subject. To me bloggers just represent people who want to state there opinion on a particular topic or subject. Now that I am aware of what a blog really is, I will take the time during the next presidential elections and see how the blogs are part of the political world. I will also focus on those who are the bloggers and how there comments make a difference.

January 22, 2006 |

HollaDH8

Although I am not usually an active participant on blogs, I believe they serve an important purpose. There are not too many places where you can anonymously ask a question or throw out an opinion and get truthful feedback from people like yourself. Or are they like you? You can never be sure who is responding to you. But maybe it is a positive concept to get responses from individuals who are not your equal. Where else can a housewife have a say on political concerns brought up by a man who would not give her a second thought it not for the anonymity. I find it hard to be able to know who is posting on blogs. Let us be honest, we like the idea anonymity. With anonymity there is the power of true freedom of speech and equality. So I guess in my mind the literal question remains, “Who are bloggers?”

January 23, 2006 |

cec13

What is a blog?

Blogs are shared on-line journals where people can post diary entries about their personal experiences and hobbies. Blogs are not limited to politics. MySpace is a great example of a nonpolitical blog, which introduces the blog to America’s youth. Women share recipes over the Internet, and men blog about sports.

To say that political bloggers “tend to be male, higher income, higher educated,” is just based on the fact we live in a male politically dominated world. Women are coming to the forefront in politics and I would not be surprised if our next president is Hillary Clinton.

“Political bloggers tend to also be political activists…”. When does someone give an opinion on politics with out trying to persuade someone one way or another? There is not much I do not agree with. This blog is right on the money.

January 23, 2006 |

Hen

Post a New Comment

Enter your information below to add a new comment.

My response is on my own website »

Author:

Author Email (optional):

Author URL (optional):

Post:

↓ | ↑

All HTML will be escaped. Hyperlinks will be created for URLs automatically.

PolicyByBlog

Who are Bloggers? Who Do Bloggers Represent?

Reader Comments (89)

Post a New Comment

Link an External Response