Reader Advocate: Blogs big hit with many Trib readers

This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2008, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.

Blogs - or Web logs - are children of the Internet.

In general, blogs are a mix of personal opinions and links to material on other Web sites. And because they reflect the personality of the writer, they can draw huge audiences if they click with readers.

One of the first blogs to draw a mass audience was The Drudge Report (http://www.drudgereport.com), written by the conservative Matt Drudge, who created an image by wearing a fedora all the time. Although he does do some reporting, Drudge mostly posts links using huge, screamer headlines that imply, "If you don't read this story, your head will explode."

On the other end of the spectrum, the liberal Arianna Huffington (http://www.huffingtonpost.com) started by getting her famous friends to blog on politics. Now she has a stable of writers looking at all kinds of events.

Many newspapers have developed blogs as part of their online experience. At The Salt Lake Tribune, staff writers blog on politics, sports, movies, pop culture, TV and other topics. Two of the newest efforts are unusual: The Crawler, by Glen Warchol, and The Vault, by various reporters and editors who file requests for public information under the federal Freedom of Information Act and Utah's Government Records Access Management Act.

Warchol is, um, er, well, snarky. And, his snarkiness is drawing readership. In part, a recent post read:

"Anderson Cooper 360 features an iReport on Democrats in Utah.

"[CNN] Associate producer Jack Gray says he wanted to spend time with Democrats in a heavily Republican state. And in Utah, boy howdy, he got what he was looking for:

"Democrats in Utah inhabit a veritable political 'bizarro world.' The state is indeed rural, heavily Mormon, and conservative. But there is also a strong, albeit small, group of Democratic activists (including Mormons) working to advance the Democratic Party platform within Utah.

"[Gray's] interviews with out-of-the-closet Democrats at Brigham Young University are especially striking. One Cougar Dem says:

" 'I definitely feel on edge. You are always ready for a fight. I know that sounds bad . . . I don't like to argue, but as soon as people find out I'm a Democrat, that's what they like to do and I'm not going to back down. Why should I have to back down like I'm doing something wrong?' "

Over in The Vault, reporters and editors tell readers what governmental agencies are willing to provide information and what entities stall until, they hope, the requests will simply die.

"Score one for openness," one recent entry begins. "The Salt Lake Tribune won a GRAMA case against the Public Service Commission [recently] over release of customer names, addresses and phone numbers in complaints filed against utilities.

"The state Records Committee on July 10 voted 4-1 to order the release of the information - in this case contained in complaints filed against Questar.

"An attorney for the PSC argued that because GRAMA makes the home phone numbers and addresses of state employees, former state employees and applicants for state jobs private - as well as addresses and numbers of people required by law to provide the information to government - the classification applied to all home numbers and addresses contained in government documents.

"He lost that argument, although he declined to speculate after the hearing whether the PSC would appeal to district court.

"The attorney kept hammering the point before the Records Committee that any time GRAMA referred to home addresses and home phone numbers it did so by way of declaring that information non-public. But that argument is flawed, going against the old saying that the exception proves the rule.

"The attorney overlooked or ignored one of the key provisions of GRAMA - 63-2-201(2) - that states 'all records are public unless otherwise expressly provided by statute.' "

Why is the information in The Vault important to the reading public? That's simple: Public-records laws outline what access any citizen should have to records created using taxpayer dollars. Those laws were created to protect you, not to protect the press.

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The Reader Advocate's phone number is (801) 257-8782. Write to the Reader Advocate, The Salt Lake Tribune, 90 S. 400 West, Suite 700, Salt Lake City, Utah 84101. E-mail: reader.advocate@sltrib.com.