Alternate Media Making Headway

Is it just me or does Pajamas Media seem to be firing on all cylinders, lately, and doing a bang-up job of providing excellent coverage on breaking stories like the situations in China and Burma, and the politics of the day?

From its very humble launch, which had many people betting it wouldn’t last six months, PJM has become a pretty impressive publication and I like that it links throughout the day to all sorts of blogs, not only those deemed “conservative” or “right-of-center.” I also like that it has brought together people from traditional print media, like the brilliant reporter, Claudia Rosett, and the historian Victor Davis Hanson, and some of the most tireless bloggers on the ‘net; it’s a nice energy over there. The site covers the gamut – you’ve got your economics page, your campaign analysis, book reviews, world politics, advice columns, internet stuff, showbiz/political stuff, film reviews, and even drunkblogging.

I missed mentioning earlier the news that Glenn Reynolds has brought his Instapundit site into the PJM home page with a feeder. Comments on that seem to be mixed, but this is what I like about PJM – a few years into the endeavor, they’re still trying new things, and seeing what works and does not; it is a dynamic, not a stagnant site. I check it every day and don’t link to it enough. My own piece for PJM, on Einstein’s about-to-be-auctioned letter, in which he writes about faith and the notion of the Jews as a Chosen People, is featured here.

Dead tree newspapers, magazines and tired news programs are being given a run for their money by the internet, and I believe the internet – where people can seek out the information and insights they want from sources of their own choosing – is making a serious dent in traditional media. The danger, of course, is the echo chamber; it is too easy to click only on those sites and writers who reflect one’s own views and then lull oneself into thinking that – because that’s the only point of view one is reading – it is the only POV out there.

But then again, I guess you could argue that much of the mainstream press is also an echo chamber, only with less consumer control over what they read or hear.