You are right that Bloggers are subjected to peer review which I believe keeps standards very high. This is not the case with main stream media where the only way to comment is via a letter to the Editor, which is always highly censored. This is what Rupert Murdoch was on about in a recent speech when he says natives (his term for modern consumers) start a blog and don't waste time writing to the Editor.

The other thing about blogs and online articles is that the quality of material is so much higher than in mainstream media. Before you had to be a card carrying journalist to have an article published even thou the only skill the journo had was writing and knew next to nothing of the subject matter.

I much pefer places like Online Opinion where I can read articles (whether I agree with them or not) written by people who actually know what they talking about. As I say to a lot of people, what exactly is the difference between a Mike Carlton or a Piers Ackerman and that of a regular Blogger? Not much if you ask me. So why are news papers paying these people when there are better opinionist out there publishing for free.