If you were at Niners Nation over the weekend, you read about Bob Costas' comments referring to bloggers as get-a-life losers. Costas made several comments about bloggers and his general disdain. Well, Bob Costas decided to contact Deadspin to discuss his comments and add some context. Whether you like Costas or not, the clarifications definitely help. And of course Costas is no dummy knowing the influence Deadspin has in the blogosphere. Here are a few highlights:
My commentary was aimed solely at a portion of Internet sports discourse, an unfortunately large portion, that consists of nothing more than potshots . . .
I was absolutely not saying that most or all bloggers were losers. It just seems so often that commenters use insults in the place of arguments. . .
As I mentioned in a comment within my previous post, there are clearly plenty of bad apples in the blogosphere. After sitting and thinking about Costas' comments that made sense. My problem existed with his generalities.
Costas: Some have inferred that I have this elitist view, and that I think only people who have been somehow "certified" have the right to comment on sports. It shouldn't be confused with somehow being superior. If you opened up anything to large numbers of participants, you'd find some real gems in there . . .
Deadspin: We think the tipoff for people being angry was the "basement" line. Everyone's a little tired of that line.
Costas: Yes, well, that might have lapsed a bit into cliche.
The big thing to learn from this is in this age of instant access, when you're a big name media member you have to make sure you are clear in your thoughts when a potential shit storm could develop. Even before this I was slightly less of a Costas fan than when I was a kid. However, I certainly will not hold his blogger comments against him. I can sufficiently clarify things in my own mind. Considering I was quick to blast him over the weekend, I felt it was only fair to post his comments to the blogosphere. Fair and balanced, right? Thoughts?