Boom time for financial blogs as traditional media fails
Posted on 23 November 2008 with 2 comments from readers
Many thanks to the 46,758 people who logged on to this financial blog last week – that is a ten-fold increase since the summer. But this is a worldwide pattern as Internet readers search for information beyond the limitations of conventional sources.
It is certainly nice to have some readers and I hope they are finding blogs useful in the rapidly changing world of current global financial markets. I can see why blogs are being used more and more. I do the same myself.
The response time of conventional news services, and even the financial newswires like Bloomberg is simply too slow in highly volatile markets. A humble blogger close to the information and a PC can deliver a faster service.
Blog limitations
However, there should be a large warning notice pinned here: bloggers may be fast but they do not have editors, lines of responsibility or regulation to control them. But if you remember that then financial blogs can be helpful.
Traditional media is reliable but slow. Take the Financial Times that has just revised its own blogging section Alphaville. Its print-media comment articles are often a day or two out-of-date and quite apart from being misleading can be downright dangerous when markets have changed their direction overnight.
I wonder how much of the printed financial media will survive the current global financial crisis. It is a liability to its readers, delivering articles that are old before they appear to be read. Even in analysis items you might find critical new events missing, simply due to printing schedules.
Blog future
Perhaps the best financial blogs will morph into advertising driven websites over time. They presently survive because their bloggers are on some kind of an ego trip to inform mankind but that cannot last for long as everybody has to eat.
Or maybe the Financial Times has the answer and every business paper should become a blog, or at least have a serious blogging section on its website. If nothing else this is a low cost addition that traditional publishers can make to their increasingly shaky business empires.
Will that put the independent blogger out of business? Surely there is room for both in this expanding area of financial publishing.
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2 Comments posted by readers:
Financial blogs are far superior to published media.
Published media ALWAYS have an agenda that may, or may not, be in the readers interests.
The agenda and the resultant spin, always takes precedence over accuracy.
Bloggers have an interest in accuracy, in so far as their readership relies on accuracy, and often the bloggers make their living trading the markets.
Long-time reading them sorts them out.
Bloomberg, etc are useful.
But for detailed graphs, correction of state-distorted figures, comparison with history, exposure of fraud in balance sheets, etc, give me bloggers everytime.
Bloggers can be successful if they focus on local companies. Although newspapers have worldwide and nationwide local bureaus, there is no way for the major newspapers to cover major events taking place in San Jose/Silicon Valley companies, for example. This is where the blogger can provide a useful experience–by focusing on local companies. http://www.gotshares.com