Shock, horror ! Blogging threatens authority !

How entertaining to hear two journalists on the Today programme lamenting the influence of the internet. This was a producer perspective par excellence. They didn't seem to like the idea that anyone can post on the net. Clearly they thought that sort of broadcasting power should be confined to the elite of professional writers like themselves. I was reminded of T S Eliot's idea of a clerisy, a class of intellectuals who would take over the role of the clergy. Of course it was the Roman Catholic church in particular that disliked the spread of literacy at the end of the Middle Ages. After all, what would happen if everyone could read or, worse still, write. It would undermine the authority of the church.