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Ars Technica has a post about a recent ruling from South Carolina that states that some bloggers are journalists. Blogs and their content had not previously been considered journalism in any legal sense, and this ruling sets a precedent that allows bloggers and the content they create to be protected as journalists and journalism, respectively. It is important to note that the ruling does not by any means declare all bloggers to be journalists. From the article:

The most important section of the ruling is the one dealing with Smith’s status as a journalist. The court admitted that it was impossible to determine in advance whether a blogger was a journalist and so used a "functional analysis" that "examines the content of the material, not the format, to determine whether it is journalism."

So, if you blog, I wouldn’t go posting whatever you want assuming that it will be protected as journalism in court. There are some things to consider when trying to determine if a blog post should be protected as journalism, such as whether a post is backed by researched, whether a post is balanced in its presentation of facts and whether a post is informative in nature.

As a blogger, I try to have a fair and balanced tone, even when it is quite obvious where my opinion lies with respect to a particular topic. In fact, sometimes I wonder if I cloud my own stance by playing devil’s advocate in posts and comments. At any rate, I doubt that there are many posts on this blog that would lead to legal troubles (*knocks on wood* — yes, Brad, I wrote it).