Perhaps it is another sign of the times we live in, but as the new social media continues to expand and evolve, various new types of information products emerge. One of these is the blog', or web log'. Wikipedia's entry on blog' indicates that as of February 2011, there were over 156 million public blogs in existence.
Blogs are often used for political commentary on a wide range of topics, or as personal diaries, or for marketing of various businesses including the arts. The blog is a place for conversation about many topics, or a discourse about a specific topic, or it could be one person's rant. A blog has a more informal feel to it than traditional websites that represent organizations in a more formal manner, displaying publications, contact information, etc. Blogs may stand alone or be part of larger websites.
Climate change is a topic that has been the focus of many blogs. Some examples include RealClimate.org, climatechange.com.au (from Australia), my big fat planet' which is a blog hosted by NASA scientist Amber Jenkins (climate.nasa.gov/blogs), and Climate Progress (thinkprogress.org/tag/global-warming). Climate change sceptics (deniers) have also used blogs to promote particular views critical of climate science or climate change policy. Examples include globalwarminghysteria.com, and globalwarminghype.com/blog.
The blogosphere' is very different from the refereed literature, and one should not expect that most blog-based narratives will have the same kind of text, language, supporting data, or review process as one would see in this and other research journals. But do blogs offer useful insights? Can they identify sources of information that might be valuable as we try to sort out the various risks and uncertainties associated with climate change research, and its linkage with decision making?
Climate Change Adaptation in 2010 by Brian Thomas is a selection of entries posted in 2010 on the author's blog, carbon-based-ghg.blogspot.com. It is self-published, and follows a similar publication of selected blog posts from 2009.
The posts are presented as a series of entries on various adaptation topics, according to the date posted on the blog, from January to December, 2010. Each entry is around one page in length, and ends mid-passage. This allows more entries to fit into one volume, but the reader must to go to the blog itself in order to find the rest of the original post. Each of the 250 entries is accompanied by a reproduction of a publicly available graphic or photo, some of which are difficult to read due to poor resolution.
The entries themselves cover a wide range of topics relevant to climate change adaptation. Examples include (by date of posting); climate insurance (February 22), West Africa sets out to protect dying mangroves (March 9), China says dams not to blame for low Mekong levels (April 5), New York City adapts to climate change (June 2), adapting to climate change in the Canadian plains (July 21), worst impact of climate change may be how humanity reacts to it (August 6), carbon imperialism devastating Africa (September 13), Norway unprepared for climate change (November 18), and adaptation calls for government-business teamwork (December 6).
Sources for these various entries include the mass media, other blogs, news from universities and government agencies (such as a European Space Agency item on a new satellite (June 30)), and stories from trade publications or newsletters (such as a Seed Daily item on soil microbes (November 30)). The lack of an index makes it difficult to group entries by topic (agriculture, coastal, etc.), or region (Africa, Europe, etc.), or to track the range of sources used.
The book offers a snapshot of the Carbon Based' blog, and with that, a window into the daily chatter, or corridor talk, that is out there but that many of us may not be following. I'm not sure I would want to purchase books like this, as they are really only marketing particular blogs that are already freely available on the internet. However, I think it is important to be aware of these conversations on climate change, because they give us a sense of how climate change research is affecting public perceptions of the issue.
Traditional research publications focus on communication within the peer community, but this pathway of communication may not tell us whether climate change research can enable decision making on adaptation or mitigation. Engagement beyond the peer research community is becoming an important component of climate change impacts and adaptation work, and will become even more important as decision makers seek a greater understanding of the choices they face.
We may feel uncomfortable about the visibility some climate change blogs may have, and we may wish that decision makers would pay more attention to the refereed literature. Indeed, the idea behind the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) was that it would serve as a mechanism for regularly assessing large volumes of literature and distilling this down to small accessible summaries for policy makers,' so that peer-reviewed science might enable decision making. But IPCC assessments take up to five years to complete. Blogs are doing this kind of outreach in a faster, less formal, and less structured way, and they are often representing particular points of view. They wear their biases on their chests, they do not have to undergo extensive review processes, and traditional research communication is being challenged by this uncontrolled range of voices. The media are beginning to pay attention to blogs and their impacts (see, for example, the Yale Forum on Climate Change & the Media, yaleclimatemediaforum.org).
So, what impact do blogs have on researchers and decision makers? Do blogs also influence the classroom? Whether we agree or disagree with a particular blog's point of view, it is important to be aware of the ever changing discourse of the blogosphere. It may help researchers and educators to understand their new audiences in the meeting rooms and lecture halls of the 21st century.