Blogosphere on The West Wing

Last night the word "blogosphere" was used on one of TV's top rated dramas maybe for the first time but the mention really wasn't complimentary.

On the show The West Wing, an Internet site (the idea that it was a blog is inferred) posts a rumor that White House Chief of Staff CJ Craig is a lesbian. This post is picked up by the main stream media and CJ finds herself the subject of "snickering" and additional rumors (such as another Internet site mentioning CJ about to coach in the WNBA).

The inference is that people can post whatever they like on the Internet with no repercussions. The opposite is true.

On the Internet there is a peer review that exists to an extent that is impossible for legacy media. On a blog every bit of a post is subject to scrutiny by experts on every possible bit of minutiae. Changes to errors are swift and often times generate more traffic than the original post. Not so in traditional media.

As a baseball fan I can distinctly recall main stream New York papers publishing rumors on separate occasions that catcher Mike Piazza was gay and that pitching great Sandy Koufax was gay. I have no such examples to offer for similar things happening from the Internet. But on The West Wing it is the "blogosphere" that is responsible for spreading rumors.

As a show, The West Wing has really gone down hill since the departure of Aaron Sorkin. Last night was a new low.