In Blog We Trust

Trust is a necessary bond between reader and author but with so much today it seems that trust is less in articles of truth and more in articles of sensation (with actual truth trailing behind). That is, readers are trusting (no, expecting) to be entertained, and when the truth is less scintillating than conjecture and rumor, guess which gets read to the final exclamation.

And what builds up that trust is knowing the relationship of that blogger to their material, having some idea of why they blog, who they are.

The tone and style of their writing also has an effect because that’s the voice of the blogger, and as human beings, we rely a lot on tone of voice and phraseology to tell us about the content and the source.

I trust the self correcting mechanisms of blogs more than the very fenced off methods of old media.

That’s not to say I distrust all media, old or otherwise, all of the time. However, I’ve sent corrections to blindingly obvious mistakes to articles in newspapers I read online. I’ve never once seen any correction implemented and I’ve never received a reply from the journo.

A blog allows everyone to see this correcting process and to trust or distrust based on the response of the author. Newspapers, for the most part, do not do this. Or at least they do not do this in a very efficient manner. A letters pages or wotnot these days is way behind the game.

The need for trust in the business world not to mention the scientific world is also paramount to the evolution of a truly sustainable society. Unfortunately current political and economic power structures and funding arrangements are not conducive to trust.

The destruction of trust through cynical malipulation of consumers by large insensitive corporations is also a serious problem. It is surprising how often big business [esp the motor trade] prefer the myths of their own marketing departments to exploring the genuine desire on the part of a significant portion of the public for a genuine shift to sustainable economics, even at some personal inconvenience.

The ultimate lack of trust is demonstrated by the Patent system. If instead an inventor could publish a novel idea on the web – trusting that if anyone takes to production and makes a profit out of it they would be honour bound to offer say a modest .005% royalty or just an acknowledgement, ideas would be developed much quicker and none could be bought up to be sat on to protect earlier investments.

Obviously where large amounts of research effort need to be recouped/protected the existing system would still be available.