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October 12, 2007
Ooooh, Blogs are Now Authoritative
Whoa, apparently blogs are now authoritative. The NIH has released a style guide for properly citing a blog as an authority in an academic paper.
Like Alex, I think it's a little bizarre that they hang on to location in a post-geography world, and I don't think it makes sense to give a generic URL, rather than a specific one, but it's a start.
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How odd - there's been syleguide rules for a long time now on how to cite a web page... a blog isn't any different in that respect.
They could have just said "do blogs the same way."
"Citation" and "authority" have always been advisedly mutually exclusive. Citing blogs has the potential to enhance this...
Still more flaws: omits the post title, plus "date of publication" is the year the blog was created (useless) rather than the date posted. Full roundup plus links to a better solution on my post.
"And there's no guarantee that a URL (or blog) will exist after few years.."
Most internet reference styles require that the date of access be stated. That is not included here and is a potential problem.
I agree with Andi that the cause and effect relationship is a bit muddled. It is possible that authoritative authors' blogs can be cited; but to assume that a blog has authority because it was cited is a leap. WHAT was cited is important. Say a critique of a paper on a blog getting a rebuttal or explanation from the paper's author may be 'authoritative' but that does not make the blog authoritative.
But good seed of an idea.
And there's no guarantee that a URL (or blog) will exist after few years when the blogger forgets to renew the web domain or that blogging service closes down.