Steve--love ya dearly--adore your blog--but when you make your point by writing, "Thats got to count for something" (sans apostrophe) you point up why the editorial process is valuable, even for fluent, careful folks such as yourself. Blogs are useful, but they are (as I have written elsewhere) literary barebacking. People know this, too. The editorial barriers that add time and cost to the publication process also add quality and raise the trust factor for the reader.

I think there's a middle ground between an article that could spend two or three months in the pipeline and the things that burble out of our head and immediately get blogged. I'm not suggesting blogging is bad--blogging has its place--but it's not a replacement for other types of information so much as a new kind of resource.

Having looked at Martha's blog post on Libraries & CMS, I think there can be some value to these posts getting information out to the community sooner, but if she leaves it here and never publishes it then it's not likely to reach a wider audience - and as Karen points out - may not improve from the comments and suggestions a good editor can provide.

While getting one's thoughts out there quickly may provide a quick rush of accomplishment, on the other end of process is that little thing we call permanency. Ok, so none of our stuff will matter much a century or two from now, but if it's on the weblog - how will LIS students doing some library research on this topic several years from now find Martha's item. When you consider that many bloggers just abandon their blogs at an astounding rate (a figure I saw recently was along the lines of over 100,000 a month - even though there are still millions of blogs), these sorts of writings are apt to eventually disappear or may become unfindable. The various blog search engines may help, but it's not the same as if Martha's piece was indexed in Library Literature or LISA.

Other sorts of articles involve research that cannot be simply distilled in a couple of hundred words - they need the longer format that a formal publishing provides. For an example, look at Hal Shill's indepth study of library buildings and how they serve users in the latest issue of College and Research Libraries. I couldn't imagine Hal doing justice to all of his findings in a blog piece - at best he could do a bit of shameless self-promotion to point readers to his more detailed article. I could say the same about an article I'll have published (don't know when) about the intersection of library databases, courseware, and e-reserves. It addresses some of the issues Martha raises in her piece, but my co-author and I go into far greater depth with anecdotes and discussion of the issues. We couldn't have done justice to it in a blog environment. However, since this is a Haworth journal (a bad reputation for publishing on a schedule) we'll have to wait. On the other hand, I like to know that I've got an article or two in the bag - and that I'll have something to add to my resume in the next year - even if I don't have a chance to write something formal later on. Yes, you can praise the virtue of publishing immediacy that blogs provide, but I also think there is something good about anticipation. I kind of like not knowing when my article is going to be published - and then all of sudden there it is.

And finally, you will have situations where you have a really good idea for an article - because it is nice to see yourself in print (though I wouldn't get all giddy about it like the blogger Steve pointed us to) - and if you want it to get published - some of the premier publications won't publish something that's already been released in another journal or format - like a weblog. So there are situations where you need to keep the content under wraps until it gets formally published. To my way of thinking, that's what conference presentations are for - to discuss those topics, ideas, etc. that are going to eventually get published - without having them appear formally in some printed or electronic format (that a publisher can point to).

So there are definitely writers whose comments and ideas I want to follow without waiting for them to publish something formally - but the vast majority of library bloggers don't fall into this category. I'd recommend that they invest the time needed to develop and write a high quality article because going through the effort and editing process could only help their analytical and writing abilities - which in the long run should help them improve the quality of their blogs. Are they will to sacrifice immediate gratification for quality end results? Sounds like the debate we have about our own end users.