Oliver Kamm… Again

Via the Devil’s Kitchen and James Higham, my attention is unfortunately drawn once more to the unfounded assertions of the smug, self-appointed critic of all that is blogging; that pompous twat, Oliver Kamm. I’ve discussed Kamm’s fatuous pronouncements on blogging before; here and here. However, once more unto the breach, dear friends.

In many respects, DK says it all:

…it is obvious, from his writing, why he got his columnist job; his posts carry all of the hallmarks of the smugness and lack of willingness to engage (he doesn’t allow comments) displayed by almost every other MSM scribe. Although, Kamm is worse than many combining, as he does, the massive self-assurance of the MSM with the sanctimonious self-justification of the left into a kind of uber-righteousness.

Which is pretty much why I don’t read his drivel either. Until, that is, I am drawn to it because he has made another pronouncement on a subject on which he is singularly ignorant; blogging. As DK points out, Kamm does not allow comments on his blog, so does not understand the two-way nature of the medium (or is afraid of it). Even so, he refers to himself inaccurately as a blogger.

This is not the first time I have heard of journalists inferring that bloggers are competing for their turf and do so by feeding from the very thing we criticise. This is a generalisation. I do not seek to become a “citizen journalist”. I write because I want to. I use this place to sound off about things that annoy me, to inform when I have something to say about those subjects dear to me and about which I am an occupational expert – something Kamm clearly is not. Blogging is more akin to a discussion in a pub than a replacement for the conventional media. Only this is a conversation that is worldwide. Blogging is no more parasitic than those pub conversations it emulates and is as varied in its quality, accuracy, intellectual comment and stimulation.

What particularly annoys me – along with the gross generalisations – is the staggering accusation that we are amateurs and therefore have nothing to say:

Without a story to comment on or an editorial to rubbish, they would have nothing to say.

Most blogs have nothing to say even then.

Funny that. I seem to manage to write something most days. Whether people find it sufficiently interesting to read is another matter, but I do have something to say. Equally I read blogs written by others most days. I find them a mix of the informative, the amusing and the interesting – something I cannot say about Kamm’s writing.

For someone to accuse thousands of others with such a generalisation as “most blogs have nothing to say” is pretty rich; particularly as his own outpourings are banal, and profoundly dull. Indeed, one might come to the conclusion that Kamm has nothing to say. However, a more accurate assessment is that he has nothing to say that is worth the effort and waste of a part of my life to read.

Without editorial control, they are unconstrained by sense, proportion or grammar.

Editorial control is overrated. It simply means that someone else changes what you write to fit in with the publication’s policy, word length requirements or the editor’s opinion on what they think you should have said. There is no guarantee that they will correct inaccuracies or grammatical errors.

Again, to suggest as he does that thousands of people are unable to string a sentence together is a rich piece of effrontery. True, there are those to whom syntax is a stranger, but many blogs are well written and thought provoking. I take great care over my writing and proof read each draft several times before publishing and then go through the whole thing again. I do admit that commas have a tendency to slip under the wire unnoticed and I have to go through the piece culling the little buggers. That does not mean that my work is grammatically poor – unless Kamm is the model of perfection?

Kamm’s dismissal of bloggers as amateurs is typical of the smug professional who assumes that payment somehow equates to quality. I consider myself an amateur writer, just as I am an amateur photographer (although I have been paid for my writing and am currently working on a paid article). It means that I can devote time and resource to something that I do because I want to, unconstrained by editorial policy, resources or deadlines. It does not mean that my work is any less worthy or that it is somehow poor when compared to that of the professional.

According to my dictionary, an “amateur” is someone who engages in an activity for pastime rather than gain. It is only the so called “professional” who sneers at others for doing unpaid what they do for remuneration. Of course, not all professionals are professional, are they?

I’m deeply sceptical of the value of political blogs and hostile to the whole medium of blogging.

The feeling is mutual. I am sceptical of the value Kamm offers the debate, given that he issues his pronouncements without any discussion and relies on generalisations. I am hostile to pompous pricks who write off a whole medium based upon their own narrow world view, prejudices and the spectacle of one blogger making a tit of himself on television. On the matter of Guido being a complete arse on Newsnight, I’m inclined to the same view as James Higham; he did us no favours.

I’ll leave the final comment on Kamm to the esteemed DK:

Ha! That’s right: having spent a couple of hundred words decrying blogs, young Ollie’s blog is then highlighted (although they have failed to actually put in a link). Nice one! Irony and incompetence in one sentence. Come on, you’ve got to laugh…

Says it all, really. Oliver Kamm; pompous twat.

Update: More pompous twattery from the bumptious Kamm in today’s groan.

Blogs are providers not of news but of comment. This would be a good thing if blogs extended the range of available opinion in the public sphere.

Which they do.

But they do not; paradoxically, they narrow it.

Factually inaccurate – blogs cover a wide range of comment and opinion; one is restricted only by where one’s mouse leads.

This happens because blogs typically do not add to the available stock of commentary: they are purely parasitic on the stories and opinions that traditional media provide.

If Kamm’s tedious and inaccurate scribblings are what we can expect from conventional media, blogs far surpass it. After all, a trawl through the range of blogs provides us with opinions from those who, unlike Kamm and his self-satisfied colleagues, are experts on the subject matter they are discussing. So who will I believe? An ill-informed pundit like Kamm or an occupational expert who understands and knows their subject intimately? Don’t all rush.

As Timmy points out:

So if political blogs are too restricted a group (encompassing, as they do, everyone from Lenin’s Tomb to well, places like this for example) are they a more or less restricted  group than those at Westminster and those overwhelmingly Oxbridge upper middle class types who are the editorial staff of the nation’s newspapers, TV and radio stations?

Well, quite. What a bumptious arse Kamm is. That and an arrant hypocrite. All debate is valid, that is the point of a democratic process. Competence is not necessary for the voicing of opinion – else we would need entrance exams for the ballot box. Just why anyone pays this smug pillock for his utter drivel is a puzzle to be sure.

Again Tim points out that Kamm’s opinions and the facts do not coincide:

The press furore over the Abolition of Parliament Bill was triggered by this short blog post. It’s a two way process, not a one way one.

Given that mismatch, Kamm’s opinions are of no value. Yup, Oliver Kamm; pompous twat and hypocrite extraordinaire.