A sign of the influence bloggers can have on the public sphere, even on people who don’t read blogs:
This is a blog post, about a daily Armenian newspaper that wrote about (in Armenian), the views of an Armenian blogger (also in Armenian).
Clearly, the views of bloggers are making inroads into the Armenian public sphere if a ‘traditional’ media outlet is referencing them. It’s pretty incredible that the opinions of bloggers are being heard by people who don’t even have an internet connection. Also, considering all the debate about the impending death of the newspaper, it’s interesting to see sort of a symbiotic relationship between ‘new’ and ‘old’ media here. The blogger benefits by having his audience increased substantially, and the newspaper benefits by being able to publish new and interesting content. This sort of relationship, though, is probably uniquely suited to a developing country like Armenia where most people have limited internet access or none at all. In the U.S., almost everyone has access to the internet, so publishing a blogger’s views in a newspaper would be redundant.
