As the author of the other article on blogging published today at Online Opinion, I couldn't disagree more. Readers could consult my article - http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=3376 - to find out why, but, naturally, I've also responded to Mr Donahoo at my blog - http://larvatusprodeo.redrag.net/2005/04/22/bahnisch-on-blogging-online-opinion/

Mark Bahnisch
http://larvatusprodeo.redrag.net/

And - in the spirit of the medium.

I have responded to mark in his blog...

http://larvatusprodeo.redrag.net/2005/04/22/bahnisch-on-blogging-online-opinion/

well aware if I start to engage too throughly in this process others will use it as a way of debunking my argument.

Yet - there are thousands of such interactions going on online everyday - hundreds on this forum already this year...how many have you read about? How effective are these discussions really? Or are they just a vent.

How many hours have people wasted pooring over emotionally charged forum comments? Has it changed views? Is the world a better place for engagement of this kind - where identities are never disclosed and slander and vitroiol often regin?

The internet is a valuable tool. It is also an addictive one that must be used in moderation...

Daniel, it's actually easier to debate the issues on a blog where there aren't rules such as:

"No more than 2 posts per article in any given 24 hour period".

Hence if we were to start engaging in a realtime interaction, we couldn't do it here.

Make sense?

Well Daniel is a lot less influential than he thinks.The perfect article to write when he runs out of ideas.Pathetic!!

Bloggers are just another word for whingers who don't have the substance to say what they mean out loud. I blog I whinge but I am also out spoken. If the Bloggers of the world got together then maybe they would make a difference. The dumb so called mum & dads make the choices in Australia (at the moment). This will all change very shortly when it is realised money don't make my heart pump. Where's all my taxes and health care payments gone and my super is worth nothing. What do we do just blame the silent majority who blog. The loud dumb people will die soon

Although I wouldn't go so far as to just call them just whingers, the whole blog scene seems to be a lame attempt to attract attention or pretend like your opinion is worth listening to, much like what i am doing now.

Everyone has an opinion, and just because you don't have a million dollars or a string of academic qualifications behind you, doesn't mean yours is unimportant, because everyones opinion is important. So what does qualify someone to be able to bombard us with their opinions? We'll judging by the media opinions we get everyday, or the ones my lecturers attempt to drum into me, not much.

However I would say that to be able to express an opinion, you must have to take responsibility for that opinion. A blog is a cheap way to get off with trying influence people whist taking no responsibility for the effects of this or having to take ownership of it in their lives. Lets face it, I could blog about the evils of gambling, and then spend all day in the casino. Or I could blog about the need for reform somewhere, people take my opinion on board, change it, and it all goes to pieces and I am not at all responsible.
The price of Influence, Leadership and ultimately, as the quote goes, Greatness, is Responsibility. If you have so much to contribute, take a stand, do it publicly, relationally and in reality, not on the web, and stand up and take responsibility, like our politicians, that so many of the barbs in these blogs are directed at, do everyday.

"Donahoo argues that bloggers are not as influential as they think".
He cannot know what I think.
Where is it written that bloggers have to be influential?.
The blog world is a more accurate measure of how people think than any poll could be, and you can safely bet money that political parties read blogs and that might be regarded as 'influence'.
This Forum is a blog so you all might as well go home now,
and because bloggers are a connected community and have offline group meetings, my coup de grace - IT'S A SOCIAL ACTIVITY, DUMMY.

I see blogging a bit like junk mail in the letterbox. Sometimes, I chuck it, sometimes I skim through it quickly and then chuck it and occasionally I pick up a good bargain. It is social and if someone wants to blog their patootie all over the net, so be it. A bit like the idiot box innit?

a pox on you donahoo. two of my blogger friends have closed down because your OPINION gave them enough doubt of themselves to quit.

male bloggers tend to rally round political issues, teenage bloggers tend to ramble about their aspirations and personal activities and their Links Lists are all their friend's blogs; but somewhere between those two ends, the middle ground has some interesting exchanges of ideas and influences in areas of literature, cinema and social issues. Similar to the newsagent's magazine racks - you may buy into the absolute rubbish Who Weekly, or get National Geographic and learn something.

I can see from the number of posts here, that your spiel leaves the crew here cold. Elsewhere, Adrianna Maxwell's opinion of Nicole Kidman has more than 75 comments.

THIS site is titled after all OPINION ONLINE, and if the blogger's opinion's don't matter, then neither does yours.

"Daniel Donahoo argues that blogging and bloggers are not as influential as they think."

If this is true, so why are Mr Donahoo and his partner seemingly waging war via comments on Brownies blog? Bizarre and completely contradictory behaviour for Mr Donahoo who views bloggers as "those who are just sad". Which begs the question, just why are the Donahoo's paying so much attention?

"The greatest influence that blogging is having, is on the nature of our human relationships."

Considering the Donahoo's recent comments, this quote could be read in context of quite another subtext.

Dear ‘world of blogs’ –

Influential or not, I appear to have made my mark on a small part of the blogosphere.

And amid the comments boxes and feedback loops I feel I have been taken somewhat out of context by the title that was given this piece…

I did not write the title to this piece, it was given by (I assume) the editor of sub editor who posted it. Nowhere else in the body of the text do I call bloggers sad. I actually don’t think they are.

What do I say?

I say that blogs, like other non-online aspects of our lives, are a call to be recognised. Like suicide, or joining a rock band, or auditioning for a reality TV show…this piece is more about the problems with the off-line world than the online world. I don’t think it is bad searching for your voice and wanting to be recognised. Hell, it is one of the reasons I write and try to get it published publicly.

I say that online relationships lack something real offline human relationships have. And, I think they do: touch, tone of voice, something intangible…just ask bloggers and chatters who have fallen in love and travelled the world to be together – they do it because we ultimately all want physical relationships not virtual ones.

I say blogging isn’t as influential as Tim Dunlop suggests.

To those who ask ‘who says blogs are influential’ – well the answer is Tim Dunlop, and a few others. It is a fair opinion, one I disagree with – but may be proved wrong. I agree with their idea that blogs help to make people more democratically engaged.

Thanks to a title I believe I have been taken out of context, but hey, that is how it goes. Re-read the piece. I don’t think I’m as harsh as I’ve been portrayed as being.

Though – I like gilly-san’s thoughts…I think they portray what I feel uneasy about in the blogging world.

I still think there's some of a false dichotomy persisting in your argument, Daniel. As a number of people said at my place, relationships formed online can often go offline. You may or may not be aware that there are frequent fora for bloggers to meet in person in most Australian cities and that many of us correspond by email and meet when we can.

As someone also remarked, can you walk down to your local pub and start a chat with random individuals about politics or culture? Probably not - there's every likelihood that they're not interested.

Even in places like academia, there's little discussion of ideas most of the time. A lot of academics prefer to talk about workplace gossip and intellectual one-up-personship. Conferences are often setpieces where "discussion" is about attention gaining and reinforcing deference and hierarchies. A huge number of people who participate in political blogs have remarked that it provides a source of intellectual stimulation not available to them otherwise.

There are also assumptions about where this f2f discussion takes place and its conditions of possibility. What about those who are shy, regionally isolated, ill or living with a disability? Again, the internet provides avenues for discussion and interchange where it's not so easy out there in the much vaunted "community" - where most of our relationships and interactions are increasingly instrumental anyway.

I also think that the whole thrust of the face to face presence is more meaningful argument is a weary one. It firstly ignores the fact that a lot of communication and sharing of ideas has always been mediated (for instance through the correspondence circles active in the Reformation and Renaissance between scholars and writers many of whom never met) and secondly ignores most of the sociological and psychological research on the positive effects of online sociality.

I've asked you to engage with that and you haven't.

It seems to me your main point is a sub-argument of the "social capital" debate, many of whose assumptions about declining sociality are themselves open to challenge.

Ok Mark –

We could continue to counter examples if we wished. For all your positive examples of people’s experience of blogging, I could produce negative examples of people’s experience of blogging. You'd agree it isn't all one way.

I agree with you that the online communication experience has significant benefits to a whole bunch of isolated people in society. I agree that it brings people together and lets them share ideas and discover new ones. Are blogs and other forms of online communication dynamic and interesting? Yes.

Still, I will I continue to argue thought that blogging, or any screen based activity has changed the world of human relationships for the worse.

Why?

Because it doesn’t ask us to go down to that pub you mentioned and strike up a conversation, try and find a point of common interest - because we just don't have to put in the effort. Home entertainment means we spend less time in more communal environments. Blogging is a step back to engagement after television, video and surfing the net – and everyone is excited about it. But, it still seems to me to be regressive because it denies key aspects of being human.

This line of argument doesn’t fit well into the academic framework you are probably used to. Just like governments or other institutions the academy has its own set method of dialogue - one I am not altogether comfortable with or believe is accessible to a majority of the community.

But, what I am arguing about is the intangible nature of holding someones hand or touching their elbow. The power of non-verbal communication that can let you know the subtle nature of what someone is trying to say. Blogging doesn’t do that. Yes, it engages in the intellectual, but it can not engage in other ways. And most of us are more interested in the emotional, the spiritual and the sublime.

Perhaps we just have to agree to disagree. But really, my broader agenda is about strengthening offline communities, not dismantling online ones.

We may indeed, Daniel.

I'm not sure what you mean by the academic conventions I'm used to.

I'm also interested in building offline community - I just don't think that it's incompatible with online sociality.

Too many blogs spoil the melting pot. Editors needed?