So Dan Hannan (Tory MEP) applauds the improvement in the left wing blogosphere, pleased that they’ve started to ‘get their act together’ and draws attention to Tory Blogging Supremo Iain Dale’s post bemoaning the lack of ‘new blood’ in the Right Wing blogosphere. Hmmm.
Now quibbles about Left and Right aside, this notion of “the blogosphere” really refers, in this context, to a very specific niche of political blogs that includes Guido Fawkes, Iain Dale et al. There are other political Blogospheres in the UK but THIS one dominates. Let’s call them the “Broadway” bloggers. Now, “Broadway” blogs carry advertising from a company which is owned and run by “Broadway” bloggers, and they make the rules about which blogs are “Broadway” – for example, the size of the audience, the demographics, etc. Perhaps I’m an “Off Broadway” blogger. Ha.
But I digress. That’s the metaphorical explanation of the office politics behind these particular scenes.
My theory about why the Right Wing blogosphere seems to be lacking “new blood”? It’s probably because Iain Dale has done rather too good a job at securing his place as the patriarch of “Broadway” blogs and thus, in many ways, is is the primary gatekeeper for new bloggers… but his attention has been focused elsewhere these days. The barrier to entry is lot harder than it used to be.
I say this because, in the past, I have been linked to by Iain Dale many, many times. Not really because he’s mentioned me, but from his “Daley Dozen” feature where he would link to interesting stories he’d found, which was a fantastic way of finding new blogs, new talent and generally being noticed. You could email Iain and say, “Hey! Read this!” and being a nice guy he sometimes did, and sometimes he’d link it and if you were very very lucky he’d put you in his RSS feed reader.
I don’t really know how much this sort of thing helped – Letters from a Tory was another wonderful blog that would link to me, too, and he’s also gone. I got a lot of links from Devil’s Kitchen, but DK’s psychologically moved on from blogging to focus on business and I don’t blame him for that.
Those days feel like a long time ago now. I don’t know how much this sort of (and I’m turning into a Marxist just saying it…) community support helped my blog, but I can’t deny that it must have been a factor. Without that attention from established blogs, how would anyone know I existed at all?
The point is that if the ‘Right Wing’ blogosphere seems static it’s probably because the ladders that helped the existing blogs to climb have been pulled up (and the primordial soup of voter angst that gave birth to the ones who created those ladders has long since disappeared), while the Left Wing blogosphere is creating its own rival and alternate power/ladder structure – patronage from Iain Dale not necessary a bonus in those circles. Perhaps this is a metaphor for social mobility and people will declare, “Ha! See?”. Oh dear.
So ‘new blood’ has a mountain to climb but, wow, I can’t wait to see the mountain climber that makes it. That’s the basic “Right Wing” argument, isn’t it? Sure it’s difficult but difficult builds character, while the alternative – promoting the mediocre – certainly gets the numbers up but you’ve pretty much won by cheating.
But enough about “new blood”. The only reason this has come up is because the Right Wing Blogosphere feels jaded and burnt out these days… but I’m not quite finished blogging, thanks. I didn’t quit then start again then quit then start again just to quit again now! So shove your new blood, your ladders and your burn-out. I still haven’t destroyed Socialism, Labour still exists, and this Coalition is ONLY bringing spending back to 2006 levels so, therefore, if you don’t mind, I’ve got some writing to be doing.
UPDATE: According to Twitter, The Daley Dozen will return. So, newbies, you’ll have it easy for a bit. Slackers.
UPDATE: I don’t want anyone to think this is a whinge about Iain. It’s not. He works really really hard and owes us nothing. The point is dependancy sucks and newbies shouldn’t be afraid to chart their own course instead of trying to follow those who’ve come before.
This is a public service announcement on behalf of the Blogosphere: The Wikio Top 20 “Most Influential” blogs in the UK blogosphere. Something odd appears to have happened this month for Wikio – The political charts shows absolutely no changes at all in the Top 30. He’s said it’s happened in a few charts and they don’t quite know why. We’ll have to see what happens with that.
Political blogs still dominating, it seems.
<CHART DELETED! See below… >
Update: Had word from Dan at Wikio. Looks like there really has been some kind of problem, that this chart is probably wrong. No idea what the actual problem is, but they say they’ve fixed it and are drawing up new charts now. Least they’ve had the courage to be open about it. Will update again as and when the revised charts come in.
Update 2: Here’s the real chart for this month:
Your snap-shot of what the political blogosphere is talking about (or, what the most people are linking to.)
2 – Dave Osler
Dave’s piece yesterday got opinion pieces from me, Stuart Sharpe, Dick Puddlecote and Obnoxio the Clown… some being more charitable than others, considering how honest and straight the post was.
1 – TV Leader’s Debate/”We’re Not Done Yet”
This fluff piece about Gordon on the BBC attracts commentary from Jennie Rigg, Mark Easton, Stuart Sharpe, Stephen P Glenn and UK Polling report.
Just outside these two stories, my own piece about Labour’s Poorhouses seems to be doing well, but it’s the Sun that, I think, will be the big story of the Politics Blogosphere today.
In what might be a good idea (and if it is I’ll keep doing it), I’m going to start rounding up what’s making the Wikio Top 100 blogs the most excited today. I can do this by finding out which blogs and stories in the news are attracting the most interest from political bloggers, then linking to them.
This is actually a bad day to start this, the Blogosphere’s pretty quiet at the moment with the biggest story generating only 4 links.
#4 Cable and Clegg Quit Politics Home Panel
He make think I’m out to get him, but James Graham’s ‘exclusive’ that Clegg and Cable are pulling out of the PoliticsHome panel now that it’s full of Ashcroft money earns him a link from Guido, and some socialists. Not from me though, obviously, because I’m out to get him.
#3 Britblog Round-up
The Britblog round-up is out on ‘Nourishing Obscurity’, always recommended.
#2 Polly Toynbee
Polly Toynbee’s resignation letter for Brown gets the attention of the Heresiarch who writes an absolutely brilliant piece, and both LfaT and and Tory Bear make her Quote of the Day.
UPDATE: The thing about this is that the picture changes rapidly, so it all depends on what’s going on when I take the snapshot. As it happens, there’s a new big story in town although half the links are going to Guido, the other half to Iain.
#1 Is Brown on Pills?
Guido and Iain Dale both cover the story of Andrew Marr asking Brown, “Are you taking pills” and the evasive shuffling that happened afterwards.
I’ll (might) be posting something more about this later (I lost a bet), but in the meantime here’s the list of Top 50 Lib Dem blogs, as voted for by 1500 crazy people (crazy people with good taste!). The full list is on The Voice.
Congratulations to the many varied, wonderful and interesting blogs that made this list, especially Mr Quist and Mr Thompson who, I’ve absolutely no doubt, will thrash me next year – although considering how these things seem to work, there’s going to be a few brand new blogs that are going to make us look like boring old has beens any minute! I think Caron’s said it best though – the order doesn’t really matter, this is a great showcase of LD blogging – Lib Dems aren’t some homogeneous blob – we’re as varied in real life as we are in our politics. I won’t ever accept that’s a bad thing. 
I just want to say thank you very much for voting me into such an embarrassingly high position – I’m genuinely gobsmacked to have pipped the Mighty Voice, never mind the terrifying competition from Mr Quist and Mr Thompson. I fear for my safety at Conference. That Helen Duffett packs a mean punch and Stephen Tall has been known to chase reprobate libertarians around with sticks for many many hours.
1. (-) Charlotte Gore
2. (1) LibDem Voice
3. (-) Himmelgarten Cafe
4. (3) Norfolk Blogger
5. (-) Mark Reckons
6. (-) Liberal Vision
7. (44) Caron’s Musings
8. (5) Liberal England
9. (2) People’s Republic of Mortimer
10. (4) Quaequam Blog
11. (15) Stephen’s Linlithgow Journal
12. (18) Jennie Rigg
13. (11) Cicero’s Songs
14. (7) Millennium Dome Elephant
15. (6) Lynne Featherstone MP
16. (-) Dude the Dog
17. (8) Peter Black AM
18. (9) Love & Liberty
19. (-) Andrew Reeves
20. (39) Irfan Ahmed
21. (24) 474 Votes to Win
22. (-) Always Win When You’re Singing
23. (-) Freedom Central
24. (14) Jock Coats
25. (42) Sound of Gunfire
26. (-) Willie Rennie MP
27. (-) Freedom & Whisky
28. (-) LibDem Blogs
29. (-) Hagley Road to Ladywood
30. (-) Paula Keaveney
31. (28) Fraser Macpherson
32. (26) Jonathan Fryer
33. (-) Chris Davies MEP
34. (-) Agent Orange
35. (-) Liberal Bureaucracy
36. (-) Mark Pack
37. (-) Pink Dog
38. (-) Liberal Revolution
39. (-) Birkdale Focus
40. (-) John Hemming MP
41. (32) Anything Caron Can Do
42. (45) Disgruntled Radical
43. (-) Wit & Wisdom
44. (-) Duncan Borrowman
45. (-) Nick Clegg MP
46. (-) Nigel Ashton
47. (-) Social Liberal Forum
48. (-) Steve Webb MP
49. (-) The Speaker
50. (-) Belsize LibDems
