The State We’re In

OK, Joel Turnipseed here. I’ll be doing some of the usual curatorial work that Jason does so well, but I also want to take this week to have a look at how blogs are changing how we create, disseminate, and critique our culture these days. In a world in which an Eau Claire Area Teen can post something to Digg and bring as much attention to it as an article in The New Yorker or The Atlantic (both of whom are heavy into blogging themselves these days), this seems like a good thing to do. For better or worse, blogs seem to be the new dispensation. But what, really, are they good for—or: what are they really good for—and what don’t they do very well? Helping me out this week will be:

Jessica Hagy, blogger and author of forthcoming Indexed
Douglas Wolk, music and comics critic and author of Reading Comics
Ted Genoways, poet and editor of The Virginia Quarterly Review
Yochai Benkler, law professor and author of The Wealth of Networks
Steven Berlin Johnson, outside.in & author, most-recently, of The Ghost Map
Jane Ciabattari, journalist, critic, and NBCC board member
Cory Doctorow, Boing Boing blogger and author of, most-recently, Overclocked

I’ll be posting short interviews with these fine folks throughout the week.

• joelturnipseed
• The State WeÕre In