The blogosphere: Emergence of a New Medium or New Collective Illusions?

Abstract

This working paper focuses on the news-based blogs, e.g. the blogs adopting an approach similar to that of the traditional media. The blogosphere is deemed to be, as expressed in many discourses, a redeeming outlet for the hegemony of the traditional media. The former often tends to ignore the citizen's really needed contents. Furthermore, it often misleads the citizens through the practicing of disinformation. Drawing upon what precedes this paper investigates, through an archeological/epistemological endeavor, the concept of blogging, the different perspectives of a variety of actors, and its implications on the social and political spheres. The main question is how this freedom of expression, which is an integral part of the collective representation, will rely on collective criteria that contradict it to reinforce the individual freedom. We will be concentrating on the issue that these collective representations shouldn't be viewed (considered) as an external risk threatening the collective democratic space, but rather as internal strains caused by space its self, wherein a lot of democracy representations are competing.