Blogging and the writer-editor collaboration: an overview

June 29, 11:36 AMChicago Literary Scene ExaminerRobert Duffer

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Clip Art has come a long way

The dead debate over whether a blogger is a journalist pales in relevance to what is being lost without the traditional writer-editor collaboration. Who misses it most, the writer, the editor or the reader? Does the end product suffer or does cost-effectiveness prevail? This is the first post in a three part series on the changing roles between writers and editors.   

First, is blogging journalism? Can journalists, or the editors overseeing how a journalist’s work is viewed, survive without a blog? Depends on the content, depends on the writer. Any effective journalist exploits the available technology to break news, and that includes blogs. Any worthwhile blogger practices, at least in part, the craft of journalism. That includes upholding certain if not all tenets—especially accountability and respect—of the Journalists Code of Ethics.

The current and necessary trend happening in print media is to streamline tasks. With papers shutting down, and journalists and editors competing for fewer jobs, the two are taking on more of the workload of their counterparts. Journalists, especially online, are responsible for images, layout, hyperlinking and sourcing. Many editors are generating original content.  The belated shift in technology does not spell the death of print but a more complex and interactive news delivery medium, where print issues are complemented with extra and sometimes more in-depth online coverage that offers a lot more interaction with its readership. In the case of subscription-based magazines, compared with dailies, the opposite approach prevails: online coverage teasing features that only can be found in the print issue. The latter approach sounds less sustainable given the instantaneous and myriad sources of news, but it might be able to cultivate a loyal readership.

Readers are getting a whole lot more to choose from, yes, but what is being lost on the blogosphere is the collaboration between writer and editor. If you believe that two heads are smarter than one, and four eyes are sharper than two, then the writer-editor collaboration ensures for a stronger, better product. Because news and blogs are wired into real-time dissemination, there is less time for fact-checking, culling and quoting multiple sources, and packaging a richer product with revealing images.

Does the reader miss this collaboration? Hard to say. Are expectations lowered for real-time news sources than the polished print dinosaur? Images are as important if not more important in the visual orgy that is the web. What about the writer? Does the writer miss out on the collaboration?  In the best cases, the editor helps the writer realize the story they were both imagining. In the worst cases, an overworked and overwhelmed editor can gut a story to fit space, style and demographic constraints, while the writer still gets the byline and/or the blame.

Stay posted for the advantages that a writer has as a one-man show and the advantages benefiting a writer by collaborating with an editor. And please post comments-this will be futile without your input into the discussion.