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Nothing to See Here - Blogging Models Are Hot edition

More stuff you should be reading instead of rules for the Democratic National Convention Drinking Game...

A short and to the point opinion on why racial profiling doesn’t work. (via Brown Equals Terrorist)

Boing Boing reports that 30,000 anti-Induce Act letters have been sent to Congress so far. Think it’ll make a difference?

As Professor DeLong says, they’re tax shifts, not tax cuts. This Bethesda, MD, pub owner is finding that out the hard way. (Eschaton)

Josh Marshall notes that MSNBC has adopted the blogging model in a big way. This seems like a classic competitive threat response to me. Right now there’s a clear division between the mainstream press and the bloggers. The mainstream may be seeking to remove the threat from the rise of bloggers by blurring the line. This means, a) the press acknowledges there’s a weakness with their model; b) they’re scared by the threat that bloggers pose; c) we’re likely to see a brand new model of the press within the next 5 – 10 years. (For comparison, think of AT&T after regulation. The rise of competitors like MCI and Sprint forced AT&T to lower prices and offer more features, to the point that AT&T has given up on pursuing its residential business.)

For what it’s worth, I don’t think much of what MSNBC is trying to do. The problems with mainstream media are systemic, and I don’t think they’re going to change just because a few media sites start blogs. The Hardball blog is currently filled mostly with emails from viewers… not the kind of content that’s likely to make me come back for more. I don’t think blogging is the be-all and end-all, but I do think it has its strengths. Bloggers have a head start in thinking about new ways to parse and ponder the events of the day, and they are developing an understanding of what it takes to be successful in the blogosphere. A mainstream media dependent on audiences in the tens- and hundreds-of-thousands is not likely to understand the economics or dynamics of blogging to a more narrow field.

I don’t think this is a world-changing development, either, but it sure is interesting. Functional Ambivalent gives us the story of a dissatisfied Republican who’s trying to wrest the nomination from Bush.