Carr says Montana blogger case shows how Google elevates fringe attacks

The New York Times
David Carr looks into the case of the Montana blogger who was hit with a $2.5 million defamation lawsuit after a judge ruled that she couldn’t invoke a shield law because she isn’t a journalist. The woman, Carr writes, “didn’t so much report stories as use blogging, invective and search engine optimization to create an alternative reality … In the pre-Web days, someone like Ms. Cox might have been one more obsessive in the lobby of a newspaper, waiting to show a reporter a stack of documents that proved the biggest story never told. The Web has allowed Ms. Cox to cut out the middleman; various blogs give voice to her every theory, and search algorithms give her work prominence.” || Related: Poynter’s Ellyn Angelotti on why journalist should be redefined || Earlier: Journalists may want to think twice about defending Oregon blogger who lost suit (Poynter.org)
Correction: The original version of this post incorrectly stated that the blogger lives in Oregon. She lives in Montana; the target of her attacks lives in Oregon.