I see that Joan McAlpine has done a write up of the Scottish Blogosphere in light of recent events that have seen a bit of a decimation of the politic blogs here in recent weeks. Understandably Jeff is quite pleased about it:
Who can blame Jeff from her comment:"Scotland is different in that our bloggers are highly individualised. They often link to each other’s sites, even when they are on opposite sides of the political fence.So you can access Scottish Tory Boy and Soapbox, by Labour’s Kezia Dugdale, from Jeff Breslin's SNP Tactical Voting, the most widely read political blog in Scotland."
Which may well be true but only in last month's Wikio rankings he was only one place ahead of me, although with technical difficulties mid month I floundered slightly. So by one measure we are pretty close as is Caron and was Subrosa. But it is far to say that there is an interconectiveness between all the blogs. I remember on my return from hiatus at the end of 2007 gently getting relinked to back on opposition blogrolls and pulling a few others along with me.
Joan went on the say comment about the colour that makes up the 'tartan blogosphere' but in all the various examples of blogs that she mentions fails to mention any of the Lib Dems who make up three of the top ten Scots in this month's Wikio rankings as I blogged yesterday.
Following the recent dropping of Jo Swinson from Question Time with just over 24 hours to broadcast. Caron set up a group on Lib Dem Act*which looks at media underepresentation of the Lib Dems. This is just another case and indeed one which cannot be justified, even the other bloggers from other parties emphasis the input that myself, Caron and Andrew in particular bring to the MacBlogsphere, not bad for a Englishman, a Scotswoman and an Irishman.
This is not a rant brought on by sour grapes, but is one that looks at the wider issue of media representation. It is also one of the reasons that Lib Dems blog in the way they do. We have to get our party message across in an accessible way and for us the controlled media that is blogging is one gateway to do so. Maybe Joan, who blogs at Go Lassie Go, merely made an omission in error, maybe it was just ignorance.
Some will say I'm getting pent up about an opinion piece. But we are within six months of a General Election and the only main Tory blogger and the two main Labour Bloggers as well as several Nats all get mentioned in a piece with deals with politics. Ignoring the not insignificant presence of Lib Dem Blogs in Scotland.
All in all she gave a balanced piece as far as the woes facing blogs has been in recent times as indeed I myself did pointing out not all anonymous bloggers or commenters are nasty following the sad demise of Subrosa. Indeed seeing as that was a major conduit of news to a large number of people it may well have been one other example of the Blogosphere looking out for and policing their own. The sad fact is that in this piece which is in a national paper seems to demise the influence of all but three parties, and a couple of non-aligned commentators.
* You don't need to be a party member to join act.
5 comments:
Oh Stephen, this is a bit childish is it not:
"Which may well be true but only in last month's Wikio rankings he was only one place ahead of me, although with technical difficulties mid month I floundered slightly. So by one measure we are pretty close as is Caron and was Subrosa."
I fear Wikio is a thorn in the side of blogging with people giving too much credence to its flawed ranking system.
If you want to have a game of 'who is more wide read than whom' then I shall indulge you. I see from your stats that you've had an average readership of 130 this week, I've cleared a thousand.
I know full well that that's childish but hey, you started it ;-)
Err Jeff the whole point of this was not to get at you, but to point out yet again being over looked as a party as a whole. And the Wikio is a rolling ranking over months rather than one week. A week in which you were on Iain Dale's Daley dozen twice wasn't it?
Which seeing as I was only fully up and running again late of Saturday I've been building up again since then. But hey you blinker yourself to the main point being made if you want.
Given the article is chiefly focussed on CyberNats (there was a clue in Joan's title) I will now suggest that you are being childish on two separate scores.
Fancy going for the hat-trick?
Well, the title was "Cybernats" (and by extension their opponents) so I don't think there is any disrespect to this blog. I'll buy you a consolation pint at the next bloggers' meet...
Lib Dems (and their bloggers) are just too pleasant and well mannered! ;-)
I really think you bloggers read too much into these rankings. Have you ever considered the fact that people read them with a morbid, incredulous fascination at the egos who write them? I read alot of the Lib Dem ones just to see just how much you will all jump on the nearest available bandwagon and preen yourselves about how utterly superior and wonderful you are. You then reference eachother constantly almost as if anyone really cares what you think. Why don't you just phone eachother? I have to admit predicting what take you will all choose on a given issue is so much part of the fun so please keep going. The Lib Dem bloggers have to be the best and should be at the top of all rankings as you are so smug and self congratulatory and on a daily basis further re-emphasise how far out of touch with ordinary Scottish people you really are ( and truly want to be).Good work !
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