Jay Smooth, “Please stop calling everyone and their mother ‘The First Rapper’“:

U-Roy may be one of rap’s predecessors, and among the influences that laid the foundation for rap, but he did not invent it…any more than Jocko Henderson, Gil Scott Heron, Lord Buckley or the West African Griots invented it. All of them may be forefathers, but none are the inventors. And muddling their places in music history with his sort of specious, sloppy revisionism does hip-hop AND its forefathers a disservice.

Scott Rosenberg talks about The First Blogger, as part of his promotion for his upcoming book “Say Everything: How Blogging Began, What It’s Becoming, and Why It Matters“:

It’s interesting to contrast these points because all of blogging is hip hop.

Update: If you enjoyed Scott’s video, you might enjoy the series of interviews and profiles of pioneers I did for blogging’s tenth anniversary, including Dave Winer, Leslie Harpold, Michael Sippey, and Harold Check.