HMM. Dave Winer and I (and some other folks, actually) were suspicious of a New York Times story on weblogs, since it seemed that they might be trying to hype a nonexistent feud between techies and political bloggers. Here’s how the New York Times service is hyping the story to its affiliates, courtesy of an InstaPundit reader who works at a newspaper and who may not want his name used:

BLOG-PURISTS-PUNDITS (Undated) — In the latest version of the Net techies being outraged by the onslaught of the opportunists, purists in the Weblog or “blog” community are fighting with pundits who are using the diary-like blog format to publish political commentary. “Warbloggers” is the derisive term for the pundits, whom the purists accuse of turning the Web log medium into the text equivalent of talk radio. By David F. Gallagher.

Well, I’ll have to wait and read the story to see if this is actually representative, but I have to say that Gallagher told me that it wasn’t going to be this kind of a story. After hearing of Dave’s concerns I went to the trouble to telephone him and specifically raise the issue, and he specifically denied that this was how the story was being cast. This item itself contains a howler — since the term “warblog” appears to have been invented by Matt Welch, one of the punditloggers himself. Stay tuned.

UPDATE: Dave Winer has posted on this too. I’ve emailed Gallagher, too, to see what he has to say. And Matt Welch points out that the Times has turned me and Dave — who didn’t really know each other very well — into friends. Maybe it should start trying to gin up a war between Sharon and Arafat, instead of calling for peace. . . .