Several years ago, I attended a session by EFF co-founder John Perry Barlow. In describing the difference between reading news reports by journalists and newsgroup posts by individuals, Barlow said it was the difference between looking at a map and being on the ground.

Blogs take this distinction to a new level, given (among other things) the ability to add graphics. Yesterday’s New York Times reports on how bloggers used these capabilities to report on the tsunami disaster. These weren’t reporters flying in to cover the tragedy. These were individuals who were on the scene when the disaster happened—and they happen to have blogs. “They are helping us understand the impact of this event in a way that other media just can’t,” with an intimate voice and an unvarnished perspective, with the richness of local context, according to Xeni Jardin, one of four co-editors of the blog BoingBoing.net, quoted in the NYT piece.

That makes blogs compelling - and now essential - reading, said Dr. Siva Vaidhyanathan, an assistant professor of culture and communication at New York University and a blogger. Once he heard about the disaster, “Right after BBC, I went to blogs,” he said.