What makes you an expert?

This is a question I get asked a lot when I talk about my blogs. Most people find it very curious that the topics that I write are so diverse. “Class action lawsuits?” they wonder — it’s incredulous that a chit of a girl from Singapore would know anything about this American phenomenon.

Even more challenging to tackle would be, “You’ve never been divorced, so how could you write about divorce advice?”

It’s a topic that has been burning in my mind for a while and I may shoot myself in the foot for threading on such a contentious subject. But hear me out on what I have to say.

It’s true, I’ve never had any legal training nor have I been through a divorce, and further, I’m not a nutritionist by training, so how could I have the audacity to write about dietary supplements and their benefits?

We’re all not “qualified”

You could probably ask this same question to any lifestyle journalist (I’m not going to touch on political and finance journalism where the requirements are obviously much more stringent): What gives you the right to talk about cars or fashion in a nationally (or globally) published magazine? You can bet that 90 per cent of these individuals would not have a formal education in any of these topics.

How about experience in these fields? Yes, that would make you look like you have some credentials in that respect, but in reality, most journalists have just a strong leaning towards the topics they write about. For example, an editor would most likely field restaurant reviews to a self-declared foodie in her team.

But what if said writer is not personally enamoured by the topic thrown at her? You still get the work done and make sure you do all the research you can before you scribble your words out.

When I was working as a features writer at a certain Singaporean women’s magazine, I was tossed the most hated column of all — the technology page. My editor said, “There’s nobody to take this, so since you’re new, just give it a go.” I quaked in my platforms. What did I know about mp3 players or thumb drives? Nothing! But I wanted to prove that I could do it so I gobbled up tech jargon like I was downing bitter medicine and squeezed my nose while I was at it.

But it wasn’t bad at all. Once I understood the tech terms, it was a breeze and I grabbed ideas from the plethora of cool tech sites on the Internet. I came to understand “noise reduction” and could explain what “view finder” was to the lifestyle editor. As the relationship columnist in the team, I was also pumping out articles on dating and marriage — I’m not married and have never been.

We rely on other experts

The key to producing a credible piece is to back up your article with what other experts say. Now they are the ones with the credentials and experience. It’s a time-honoured technique and it’s expected out of any credible article. I try to do this as much as possible on my blogs where I rely on very established and respected sources as the backbone of my content.

“What if you’re wrong about something and people read it — they would get inaccurate information!” a well-meaning acquaintance once said to me. “There are so many dodgy websites out there!”

For one, your readers aren’t stupid. It’s silly to assume that the reader is a passive and non-thinking individual. I do recognize that you need to shoulder social responsibility when you publish in a public space but it should be up to the reader to decide on her own conclusion and beliefs.

The way I see it is my blogs are not dodgy and I make it my responsibility to churn out good work. I don’t make false claims and there are disclaimers stated where necessary. For instance my most recent article on chamomile as a remedy for Type 2 diabetes symptoms. But I also included a statement that though scientists may see potential in this latest finding, they caution relying on chamomile as the sole means of doctoring symptoms until further research is done.

Blogging is a serious medium

When blogs flooded the Internet a few years ago, I think a lot of them were personal diaries and hobby sites, which is an image that some people still cling onto. To these people, I’ll like to say, “Hello, things have changed in the blogging universe.”

The Mail & Guardian has a post that talks about the recent phenomenon of serious blogging, Blogging as a fad is over; serious blogging arrives, where there are some interesting statistics. The New York Times, Forbes, and many other major newspapers have embraced blogging as conversational mouthpieces to reach out to more readers. Barack Obama has a blog and so does John McCain.

Blogging is serious business these days but I don’t think they replace news wires or newspapers — print journalism is shrinking rapidly because advertising dollars are channeled to online media. What I do see is that blogging is becoming a credible source of information and its appeal lies in its conversational human voice that you don’t get with hardcore news reporting.

One easy way to tell if a blog is “serious” or not is its outgoing links. Do they link to reputable sites and blogs? And the incoming links are also another sign — do they come from respected website? If you think about, it works on the same principle of using a reliable source that is a basic tenet of good journalism.

Does that give me the right to be called an expert?

The great thing about blogging is it creates this space for citizen journalism where you can tune into different voices on any given topic. So with a resounding “no”, I’d like to say I’m not an expert in the traditional sense, but I think I’ve come to know a lot more than the average Joe on the topics I write about.

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