The unspoken system of checks and balances

There’s a very interesting discussion going on right now in the realm of hockey blogging. I’m a bit of an outsider when it comes to the “mucking and grinding”, but it’s no secret that I’m a hockey fan.

What’s going on right now is a discussion about Eklund, the main guy behind HockeyBuzz.com. I don’t know enough about the guy to say much about him as a blogger, but to know him is to understand that “Eklund” is a pseudonym, he never posts under his real name, and you never see his face. Anonymity is his “thing”.

In the blogosphere, there is an unspoken system of checks and balances that fellow bloggers go to work on in order to verify the integrity of what one person claims through their posts. Now that Eklund is to partner with Sportsnet (a Canadian variation of what FoxSportsnet or ComcastSportsNet is to the U.S.) for the hoopla of the approaching trading deadline for the NHL, various folks are coming forward to address this issue of his method and content.

The discussion seems to be expanding, but you can read what Kukla, Alanah, J.J., Zanstorm, and Eric are saying about this. You can say what you want about blogging, but there is something to be said about journalistic integrity. To me, this is what all this discussion stems down to.