Peter Bart and The Blogosphere.

Peter Bart, Variety's Editor in Chief, is a Hollywood legend. No one would argue his contributions to cinema or journalism. One of the great things about him is that he's been very outspoken (in one way or the other) on many issues of importance to the movie industry.

But he's got to stop saying things that make me think he's losing his relevancy.

In an article in today's Variety, Peter Bart, a man who blogged once (once!) for the Huffington Post, manages to write an entire article on how to define the Blogosphere without giving an opinion. All he says is that it needs to be defined.

His article closes:

Clearly, the landscape is crowded and confusing, but decisions have to be made: To whom do you grant interviews and credentials? Do you reach out to individuals who consistently defy your rules of engagement, or do you scrap the rules entirely? From the Hollywood perspective, do you invite people to screenings who consistently thumb their noses at review dates?

The problem is, is that it's not bloggers that need to redefine themselves. It's not studios that need to make decisions on whether or not to deal with them. It's about adaptation. The world of online publicity is different than the world of publicity has operated within for the last hundred or so years, as I've stated before.

Studios, and everyone else for that matter, have to change. Bloggers are not journalists, by definition. But they are every bit as (and maybe more) influential. Figure out how to work with them — or find someone that does. It's not a do or don't decision.

The only decision to make is whether or not to evolve along with your consumers.

**UPDATE**
Anne Thompson at Variety gets it right.