A group of bloggers converged on Nashville, Tenn. to learn how to find the facts to back up their often vigorously-expressed opinions.

But a few things on the conference agenda raised my eyebrows and made me think the gulf between serious bloggers and journalists could well shrink in the coming years.

An excerpt from the AP story carried by the NYT:

Bloggers -- those Internet-based writers without rules -- are fighting back against criticism that their work is unreliable, libelous or just poorly done. More than 300 bloggers came to town Friday for a two-day conference that was heavy on teaching techniques used by journalists in what bloggers term ''the mainstream media.'' One class taught students how to access and analyze government statistics.

Conference organizer Bill Hobbs called blogging ''citizen journalism.''

''If freedom of the press belongs to those who have the press, then blogging expands ownership of the press,'' Hobbs said.

Right now, more than 8 million people write blogs, said Bob Cox, president of the Media Bloggers Association. Blogs, short for Web logs, are running commentaries on whatever their authors are interested in. Content often focuses on politics or media criticism and usually includes feedback from readers.

This I must take issue with:

Hobbs noted that blogs entries are corrected more thoroughly and prominently than in other forms of media.

''We write and then our readers edit us,'' Hobbs said.

I see less vigorous debate on blogs than I do in other forms of online communication.

Most comments appear to be of a "yeah, you tell 'em!" nature, and not thoughtful critiques.

OTOH, some people have helpfully pointed out some of my more prominent stupidities in this space, so there you go. :)

Anyway, I went to the conference blog: Blog Nashville, held at Belmont University and sponsored by the Media Bloggers Association.

They had a separate two-day session on computer-assisted reporting and research (CARR).

What also perked me up a bit was the organization doing the teaching was the Heritage Foundation, a well-known conservative lobby group.

The other listed sponsor was the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, which appears to be on the centrist-vaguely liberal part of the U.S. political spectrum. But I didn't see anything listing the organization's involvement in teaching anything.

But it has me wondering why the National Institute for Computer-Assisted Reporting wasn't involved.

On balance, it looked like an interesting mix of speakers and topics (anoniblogging, blogging v. journalism roundtable, citizen's journalism, making money, a respectful disagreement and many others).