Dave Winer reiterates his distinction between blogging and journalism, in the wake of Gawker’s end:

Blogs are what sources write, not what reporters write. An irreverent scandal sheet written by professional reporters is not a blog.

The piece that triggered his comments proclaims that blogging is dead. Even within its own words, though, it contradicts that idea with a more complex one – that blogging is now just one of a ever-growing number of ways of expressing yourself online. Blogging has more competition – and is edging towards middle age. Nothing wrong with that.

If anything, the end of Gawker is just your cool, rebellious friend who got ever more frantic through his early 20s, dropping out of sight because eventually the lifestyle took too much toll on him. Blogging is entering the early stages of middle age, and becoming both compfortable and useful. As MG Siegler wrote earlier, when asks
ed why he still writes a blog:

My first answer is the best one: writing helps me clarify my own thoughts on any given topic.

That will never stop being useful.