Biting the Hand that Feeds

Weblogs and Second-Level Agenda Setting

Bryan Murley and Chris Roberts

University of South Carolina

Do you know this woman?

Harriet Miers, George Bush’s nominee to the Supreme Court, is the latest to experience the heat of the blogosphere

Agenda Setting

McCombs and Shaw (1972) 400 studies related to agenda-setting New Criticism McCombs (2004): Media still set the

agenda, even with the Internet

Weblogs

Definition A web page with minimal to no external editing,

providing on-line commentary, periodically updated and presented in reverse chronological order, with hyperlinks to other online sources. Blogs can function as personal diaries, technical advice columns, sports chat, celebrity gossip, political commentary, or all of the above. (Drezner, 2004)

Blog Stories

Trent Lott (2002) Iraq War (2003) Rathergate (2004) Presidential Election (2004)

Research Questions RQ 1. Do bloggers act as another level of gatekeepers by

linking to material from traditional news media? RQ 2. How much original reporting do bloggers provide? RQ 3. How often do bloggers link to media stories to critique

content? RQ 4. How often do bloggers link to media stories to critique

the media source? RQ 5. Do bloggers follow agenda-setting priorities of

traditional media outlets?

Methodology

Content Analysis of top 20 weblogs’ material for MWF of April 11-15, 2005.

Coded: Type of post Source Secondary sources News or opinion

Truth Laid Bear

Provides ratings of weblogs according to traffic rankings.

Findings

Nearly half (n=344, 49 percent) of the 706 posts included at least one link to a mainstream media source.

For political blogs, 56 percent of the 495 blog entries include a link to a mainstream media source.

Many blog topics matched MSM topics.

Findings

13 percent of posts were critical of MSM. 72 percent of MSM links were to news

stories. Just 6 percent of blog entries featured

original reporting.

Research Questions RQ 1. Do bloggers act as another level of gatekeepers by linking to

material from traditional news media? Yes. RQ 2. How much original reporting do bloggers provide? Very Little RQ 3. How often do bloggers link to media stories to critique content? RQ 4. How often do bloggers link to media stories to critique the media

source? RQ 5. Do bloggers follow agenda-setting priorities of traditional media

outlets? Yes.

Discussion

Blogs act as second-level agenda setters. Possibility of primary agenda-setting

when blogs focus on criticism of MSM. Reliance on MSM for fodder limits

agenda-setting ability of blogs.

Future Research

How does a blog obtain the credibility status of “mainstream media” and set a primary agenda? Or is that conferred by mainstream media?

Wider pool of weblogs and blog readers to gauge agenda setting capacity.