It’s time to get back to normal here, but I still want to round-up the OSM launch with a few concluding remarks now that I am back from New York. And it seems it’s time to bring forward a few positive points among the avalanche of negativism and unhinged attacks that are spreading around the blogosphere like a wildfire. Sean Hackbarth has rounded-up a few of those comments here, alternatively you can visit that well-known Wisconsin law blogger and keep scrolling.

As someone with both a venture and blogging background, allow me to add the following to the debate. Firstly, any content-based venture that is able to raise a significant amount of early stage financing in the post-internet boom world is pulling off a significant feat. These days, investors look for solid revenue models or at a bare minimum for ideas that have a tangible potential for revenue. OSM has lined up a few seasoned Silicon Valley investors and take it from me, these are generally not the easiest people in the world to deal with. Probably few of the relentless critics in the blogosphere have the background to assess the incredible value and validation that has been given to the entire OSM project. The smart money says: an investment in blogs and alternative media has the potential for huge returns. Can anyone out there really negate the significance of that statement?

Well, there are quite a few and they use one of the blogosphere’s key tools – instant commentary – to start taking down the new venture. It brings me to my second point. Of course, mistakes are made and the very public nature of the whole OSM venture has made it an extraordinarily easy target. It was to be expected. Yet, it’s hard not to get the impression that a lot of the negativity is driven by resentment and, equally important, fear that something that started out as a free and rebel movement is now getting "institutionalized". But some level of organization or formalization in order to establish a viable business is unavoidable if you want to expand the potential and deepen the quality of what blogs have to offer.

Apart from the part-time ranter or irregular commentator, and there are lots of these, there are bloggers that want to take their efforts seriously and do indeed strive to live up to certain journalistic standards. There’s an inherent cost to achieving that as I can’t imagine that Michael Totten is going to do multiple tours of duty in the Middle East free of charge. At the same time, I can assure you that even I look critically at the risk/reward equation of providing content on a regular basis on this blog. The passion to do it requires effort, which demands time, which ultimately has a price tag. With only a very few exceptions – the Instapundit or Daily Kos come to mind - some form of aggregation or collaboration is unavoidable, even Andrew Sullivan announced that he had found a corporate home earlier this week.

The claim that blogs are now going mainstream and abandon their revolutionary roots is tenuous. Yes, the media landscape is undergoing dramatic reform and if you want to carve out a significant niche alongside the established media (who by the way will not disappear) you at the very least will have to do it on their turf. That means adopting some mainstream tools in order to get that unique voice out and if that means abandoning some of the freewheeling ways of the nascent blogosphere, so be it.

It’s beyond the scope of this post to take on the critics point by point – why even bother - but it is important to highlight what is right about OSM and why criticism is premature. OSM has now brought together a group of talented and committed individuals, capital, a technology and an idea on which it can build further. These are the essential ingredients for a journey of which no one knows where it will end. Most technology ventures end up in a place very different from where they were originally headed and still turned out to be huge successes nevertheless. The trial-and-error ingredient of that process is incredibly high and it makes life for the founders often far from pleasant, it's the proverbial bumpy ride. But, in this case, they’re off to a head-start and that is unpalatable for some.

NOTE: Although there are many good posts of the events in New York, there are a few I wanted to highlight since they really captured the spirit of the event. Neo-neocon has probably one of the best, but do also check out Fausta, The Urban Grind, Asher Abrams and The Young Curmudgeon. And Richard Landes, who has been given the urgent advice by many last week to start his own blog sooner rather than later.