Edwin Decker Wants to be a Blogger

Edwin Decker wants to be a blogger so bad that I wish I could somehow help him. I’ve been a reader of Decker’s CityBeat column, Sordid Tales, for more than a year now, for longer than I have been blogging. It is the main content that keeps me coming back to the weekly independent. His cynical wit and offensive charm are at first shocking, then endearing, but always memorable. And he’s constantly pissing readers off - another draw to keep opening the paper and keep tabs on the perpetually offended.

Recently though - let’s say for the past couple months - it’s been occurring to me just how badly Decker wants to blog, to hyperlink, to accept comments and trackbacks, to edit his own content. A few weeks ago, just like every other blogger in the blogosphere, he wrote about Ashlee Simpson’s mess up on Saturday Night Live:

Of course, for every person who’s verbally reconstructing Ashlee Simpson’s asshole, there’s another who’s defending her.

Who do you think he’s talking about when he says “every person?” Channel 7 news? No, he’s talking about us, about bloggers. Later he points us to a post on Ashlee Simpson’s own website. But poor Edwin, CityBeat readers cannot mouse-click on your column and they’re too stoned to remember by the time they get home. We are also too lazy to write letters to the editor or even email you to tell you how funny you are. But if you had a little comment box at the end of each post, I’d jot down the flattery every chance I got. And I’d let you know about every time I quoted you on my own blog.

I could point out countless other times Decker has alluded to bloggers or printed URLs in his column, but the point is this: the line between a columnist and a blogger is growing ever more blurry. The difference, in fact, is that columnists are paid while bloggers are not and this, in my mind, is reason enough to scare columnists away from the whole concept of blogging.

San Diego Reader columnist Barbarella started out as a blogger whose content was published as a feature in the weekly and then later she was invited aboard and offered her own column.

I’ve been a long time reader of USD professor Carl Luna’s column in the weekly Insight section of the San Diego Union-Tribune, but ever since he started keeping his own blog, I’ve known where to go for the real content (which is often in the comment threads below his posts). The same is true with Union Tribune TV critic, Robert Laurence and his blog, Remote Control.

I continue to pick up the local papers and weekly independents and read through the columnists because they are consistently good writers. (which can’t always be said of all bloggers) But as more and more talented San Diego bloggers fill the scene, I realize the day is not far off when I go to the newspaper only for investigative reporting and leave the commentary to the interactive blogosphere.

I’d be more than happy helping Edwin Decker start his own blog, but given the threat that it poses to the exclusivity of his career, I certainly wouldn’t blame him for turning it down.