A new logical development in the forming symbiosis between established media and blogs: US newspapers invite bloggers into the syndication service Blogburst. No big prize for predicting that the selling point “You get more traffic – exposure – readers” will tempt many (via Micro Persuasion).

Meanwhile, Daniel Drezner sums up several articles on the apparent, imminent death of the blogosphere (among them the recent piece from New York Magazine). What’s tiring about all these obituaries is their construction of an imagined opponent – the naive blog triumphalist. As Drezner notes, “a lot of bloggers have been stomping on that [triumphalist] balloon for years now”. A sophisticated, nuanced view of what bloggers can and can’t achieve has been forming for a long time, through – guess what – free and open debate. Last word to Drezner:

Hey, mainstream media types, I’ll cut you a deal — I will never say that the blogosphere is a harbinger of egalitarian democracy if you acknowledge that blogs, flawed though they may be, nudge the information ecosystem in many constructive ways.