Press Club discusses ethics, growth of blogging 04-26-2008 The Kansas City Press Club hosted a lively event that examined the ethics of bloggers and the tremendous growth of bloggers and their impact on the news on Saturday with a group of about 30 bloggers, journalists and other interested parties. The meeting was held at KSHB-TV41. Professor David Perlmutter of the University of Kansas, and author of the recently released book "Blog Wars," discussed the history of blogs and their growth. He noted that the comments directed at bloggers today were almost identical to those heard when newspapers were first created. "Newspapers were absolutely vicious when they first started and many folks thought that maybe Freedom of the Press might not be such a good idea," said Dr. Perlmutter. "Right now blogs are pretty much in the same situation, and many folks are questioning some of the things being said on them." Invited guests included John Landsberg of Bottom Line Communications, Miguel Morales, a journalism student and creator of the blog, The Latino Reporter, whose reporting forced the president of Johnson County Community College to resign, and Tony Botello of tonyskansascity.com, who has one of the most popular blogs in KC (link to his story of the event at http://tonyskansascity.com/. Steve Kaut, KSHB-TV managing editor, moderated the event. The Kansas City Press Club is the local chapter of the national Society of Professional Journalists.
