Bloggers Follow Japan

Last week, bloggers focused on two subjects that have resonated in social media before. One, the recovery efforts in Japan, has been a major topic three out of the last four weeks. The other, the climate change debate, is a subject that galvanized bloggers a year ago, but has receded since.

From April 4-8, 28% of the news links on blogs were about the fallout-literally and figuratively-from the earthquake in Japan, making it the week's No. 1 subject, according to the New Media Index from the Pew Research Center's Project for Excellence in Journalism. Most of the news continued to be discouraging as bloggers spotlighted reports about bodies found at the nuclear power plant and high radiation levels measured nearby. And there was plenty of skepticism about whether Japanese citizens were being told the truth about the catastrophe. But a report that Japan's Red Cross had raised $1 billion, but had yet to distribute any money to victims, drew particular interest and sparked a conversation about ways to find trustworthy charities. The bloggers' continued high level of interest in the earthquake stands as something of a contrast to the mainstream media, which were fixated on Beltway budget fights and devoted only 7% of their coverage to the continuing problems in Japan last week. The second-biggest story, at 25%, was global warming.