The new model of publishing is the stable of bloggers. That's the way the world is moving. Foreign Policy, firedoglake, antiwar.com, and the Atlantic have all chosen this model, replacing the professional guild/captive-advertising model of the late great newspaper. The blog-stable is a highly-evolved social organization that mingles great individualism with antilike cohesion and scraps of income.
There seems to be an understanding born of the blogosphere that an informed society depends on the accretion of tons of information, and individuals cease to matter. Notwithstanding stars like Sullivan and Greenwald, the good stuff is quickly sorted out and shared. There is a democratic leveling at work. Steve Walt and I were born a month apart. He achieved considerable status, I didn't. Now we're both bloggers. And we take Muslim voices from halfway around the world seriously too.
I'm trying to move this blog toward the Stable model and lessen my presence. This week my better half, Adam Horowitz, is away but I hope to have him back soon. I rely on him, as on Jack Ross and Saif Ammous and Jerry Slater, and several unnamed informants. I am still looking for an institutional home, and I don't mean McLean's. I can be franker about seeking donations, my chief source of income right now, when those monies are being shared with others…. Ala, the old Katz's Deli sign: Send a salami to your boy in the Army. –Phil Weiss
