bloggers = the most conspicuous of amateurs???

The Cult of the Amateur: How today's Internet is killing our culture by Andrew Keen is a book that has gotten a number of people hot-under-the-collar on both sides of the debate.

I found a commentary from Wired, which included this by Tony Long:

The Cult of the Amateur: How Today's Internet Is Killing Our Culture bemoans the rise of amateurism in all spheres of professional life, specifically as facilitated by the internet's long reach. It bemoans a lot of other serious problems raised by something as insidiously intrusive as the web, but we'll confine the focus here to the question of the amateur vs. the professional.

Since bloggers -- the most conspicuous of amateurs -- are a focus of Keen's views on this subject, the blogosphere is alive with vituperative assaults on his book, his intelligence, even his character.

Click here for the full Wired commentary.

Self-proclaimed journalists, narcissists, culture killers.. the accusations are quite steep and the criticisms back equally harsh.

I agree with Mr. Long that the debate is one worth having.

As a blogger, supposedly then automatically a narcissist, from what I have read the book's author is too 'keen' (pun intended) for me.

I could rave about the state of 'professional' journalism, the increasing constraints placed on candid opinion by media conglomerates, and question how professionalism became a magic-wand that supposedly creates narcissist-free commentary but I know others have raised these points more informatively and eloquently than I can.

The element I will query a little, speaking purely from my own 'narcissist-amateur' perspective' is the concept of culture.

I work in the so-called Cultural Industries however I'm aware that 'culture' is a label we tend to designate to particular areas, when in truth its meaning is far more expansive. I also always view culture as being something that changes/evolves (for better or worse) and although being somewhat organic can't be 'killed'.

I am approaching 'culture' from a definition courtesy of the free-dictionary (shock horror, yes from the web):

culture: The totality of socially transmitted behavior patterns, arts, beliefs, institutions, and all other products of human work and thought

Most of us who were born in the past 30 or so years have grown up with an increasing number of very public confession-style TV programs (Jerry Springer, Oprah etc.) and more recently the boom in 'reality' television. People having personal opinions and keeping diaries is hardly a new phenomenon but it has become increasingly public, dare I say a more publicly-private 'culture'.

If this is true and the 'culture' itself has morphed then what is so terribly under threat by bloggers etc. and the internet?

Is it more accurate to say that the direction that 'culture' itself is taking is of great concern to Mr. Keen?

Perhaps that wasn't a sufficiently provocative title or approach to take.