hip to be square meme watch
My friend Michael has proposed that the new hip way to refer to "blogs" should be "Internet blogs." (This is the same guy who, back in 1995, had us clarifying every mention of "the World Wide Web" with "the graphical portion of the Internet.")
Looks like Cathy Young of the Boston Globe got the memo and then some: "Jordan's downfall also attests to the rising power of the 'new media': the Internet weblogs." Yes, she said "Internet weblogs." And she put "new media" in scare quotes.
Update: Michael points out that there really is a memo: "Convinced that Internet weblogs, or blogs, helped defeat Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle and out Dan Rather's bad reporting on President Bush's National Guard duty, House and Senate Republicans are scrambling to put them on their government Web pages. "Senators want them even though they don't know what they are," says a strategist helping several GOP senators develop the chat and news pages."
Should I say something about the whole Jordan thing, while I'm here? OK: I'm thrilled that the right has finally realized that there's something unsavory about off-the-record conclaves of the overclass. I'm assuming that the calls to release the tape (which I agreed with) will be followed up with a demand to have everything said at Davos put on the record (and how about the Bohemian Grove?) And will the wingnuts turn on the Wall St. Journal now that it's cast in its lot with the MSM? Stay tuned.