Further to the previous two posts…
Courtesy of Club Troppo’s always excellent Missing Link, I was led to read Lyn Calcutt’s view on the climate change blow-up of the last few days. Interestingly, it relates pretty well to the previous two posts on Gatewatching. She thinks the latest GW spat is pretty unedifying, and writes:
Compare these brawls among a few high profile figures, where expertise is guarded with complexity and specialist terminologies, and the amazing collective intelligence at the psephological blogs before the election where both sides of politics left with more than they arrived with. People who just wanted to know who was going to win came out of it understanding some pretty sophisticated stuff about stats, demographics and strategy, and they could join in and learn even more from one another. The whole became more than the sum of its parts.
Hmmm. I can understand Lyn’s point of view, though I think the comparison has its limits. It should be remembered that the psephs have attracted their share of snark, too, getting some heavying from people in high places, and I have to say that I, at least, had to take some of their statistical reasoning on trust 
Still, the point is that she feels that the GW discussion is largely a matter of people sniping from entrenched positions, and that she’s not learning anything. For Lyn, the discussion is a little sterile.
I suppose it’s a fine line in all blogosphere stoushes - at what point does fighting your corner become raking over the coals of a stale debate? It’s very difficult to gauge, especially for people at the centre of the action who hold their beliefs passionately. And for some bloggers, on some issues, “agree to disagree” is not an option - there’s too much at stake.
Anyway, let’s hope no permanent damage is done in the current kerfuffle.
The comparison came from the level of noise both generated in the blogosphere. After that the discursive dynamics.
You mentioned Margaret Simons’ altruism thing on the pseph blogs. Last year we saw that altruism generate popular (and therefore legitimate?) esteem. Is it Quiggin who said the blogosphere is an esteem economy? I don’t see any altruism happening in the GW thing but a great deal of esteem in the self-esteem sense.
From my perspective the pseph blogs/poll wars thing was the blogosphere being its most useful, most broadly relevant, most participatory, most promising and most amazing. I do tend to compare everything else with that which is a mistake given its high salience at the time. Still, I’d argue that it’s a worthwhile comparison if you’re interested in either the democratic potential or the cultures of online discussion.
Hi Lyn - thanks for dropping in and thanks for your comment.
LOL I like the “esteem” remark you make.
And I agree with you for the most part - esepcially on this:
But as you hint, the psephs around election time were a very special case.
As I said, I’m working up to posting something longer and more substantial about stoushes - but for now I’ll say that one of the things that has been striking me is how they are a regular, everyday, almost banal feature of blogosphere discussion.
Often enough there is more heat than light, and GW stuff seems to come up again and again, as it has this week. I guess what I’m saying is that I feel like I have to account for this dynamic because it’s so common.
In this connection, one of the salient things about the psephs, IMV, is that they brought new information to the table - there wasn’t a lot of recycling of talking-points.
Anyway, it may turn out to be useful in generating this meta-discussion, which I’m sure a lot of people (including the participants in this episode) could usefully contribute to. I’d be keen to hear any further thoughts you have.
Stoushes. I think you can learn more about them watching how they’re conducted than from what they’re over, but if you ignore partisanship, trolls and flying monkeys, they’re mostly territorial urinating contests over different kinds of expertise. The sorts of word games ordinary folk can’t play which excludes people as effectively as not having internet access.
Yes the pseph bloggers brought information to the table, but I think the dynamic that also valued the bog ignorant was important. Commenters were dying to get polled so they could report push polling. Anybody in a marginal electorate was an instant authority. It wasn’t as top heavy as a lot of blogger-centric blogging can be.
So you’ve got experts bickering among themselves trying to devalue one anothers’ expertise, and experts allowing that everybody can be an expert. I’m looking at it through a cultural capital lens though, which probably makes a difference.
Recycling of talking points - I’d argue that Shanahan’s talking points were as important to the whole thing as the new information. Remember? Here’s the figures, here’s Shanahan, and here’s what’s really going on. Read it and armed with that ammunition bolt over to Shanahan’s to let him know you think he’s as stupid this poll as he was last fortnight. It was an important part of the ritual.
What’s important in the stoushing between blogs ritual though? What’s generally at stake? As far as I can see it’s esteem, but I’ll be interested to see what you think. As you say, it’s common and eventually everyone gets involved in one.
I have lots of posts about global warming on my blog, but you guys have ignored them and paid attention to a stoush instead.
Tim - please don’t take it personally. We’re not pretending here to offer a complete coverage of the online climate change debate, and indeed buying into this debate in any partisan way is the last thing I’m attempting to do. The reasn I’ve focussed on the stoush is that it’s an example of contention in the blogosphere. It’s just that the GW stuff keeps coming up.
Lyn - all really interesting. I’m post-Origin and can’t do your points justice right now. Tomorrow, I hope.