May 30, 12:02:17 PDT> Alex: Now it's time to welcome Michael Cornfield

May 30, 12:02:35 PDT> Katie Laird: Hi Mike!

May 30, 12:02:35 PDT> Alex: Michael works with BuzzMetrics and Election Mall

May 30, 12:02:49 PDT> MikeCornfield: Hello everyone from humid Washington DC

May 30, 12:04:11 PDT> Kari: hi, Mike!

May 30, 12:04:20 PDT> enochchoi: hi mike!

May 30, 12:04:20 PDT> Katie Laird: Can you give us a little background on your work with political blogging?

May 30, 12:05:24 PDT> MikeCornfield: I conducted a big study of political blogging with BuzzMetrics in the fall of 2004. The CBS Rathergate episode happened on our watch. Since then, I've commented on blogs for the political press.

May 30, 12:06:11 PDT> MikeCornfield: I've also worked with the Pew Internet and American Life project on surveys regarding blog reading and participating.

May 30, 12:06:57 PDT> clickty: Why would GPI hire http://www.thoughtworks.ca/client-list.html doesn't seem to jive with building the Net2 ecology - check it out for yourself - i don't see a single agent of change but instead a lists of who's who of corporate criminals. :/

May 30, 12:07:10 PDT> clickty: sorry that was late i was busy looking in another tab. I'll follow up with GPI myself..

May 30, 12:07:23 PDT> Katie Laird: I actually read that 2004 Political Blog Buzz study - pretty interesting stuff....

May 30, 12:07:26 PDT> Rolf Kleef: clickty, if you're at Net2, try to find me!

May 30, 12:07:55 PDT> MikeCornfield: Blogs have become part of the public discourse in the historical blink of an eye...I'm curious to see what you all think is behind this trend. Thanks for the compliment, Katie.

May 30, 12:08:39 PDT> clickty: Rolf: i'm clicktyclack@gmail.com not in SF sadly

May 30, 12:10:31 PDT> Katie Laird: I think a lot of people have become disenchanted with standard news outlets -- blogs to me seem to give a different more personal approach to big issues

May 30, 12:10:41 PDT> Katie Laird: ... like politics

May 30, 12:11:53 PDT> Tuesday Gutz: i think people have lost faith in mainstream journalism.

May 30, 12:12:40 PDT> MikeCornfield: I agree. Political blogs feed on mainstream media biases and distortions. There's poll data confirming that a huge section of the liberal-left has become disenchanted with the media, joining conservatives who have hated it for years.

May 30, 12:14:46 PDT> Katie Laird: What part of the political spectrum do you find the most bloggers or blog readers?

May 30, 12:15:20 PDT> Tuesday Gutz: they say this is the century of citizen journalism

May 30, 12:15:23 PDT> MikeCornfield: It's about even across the spectrum as far as bloggers and blog readers go. The left "netroots" has the advantage in blog-initiated action.

May 30, 12:15:28 PDT> Susan 10b: Seems like gabbly chat doesn't work for linux firefox

May 30, 12:15:28 PDT> Susan 10b: i just heard from anna feldman

May 30, 12:15:28 PDT> Susan 10b: from apc.org

May 30, 12:15:32 PDT> Susan 10b: is that tru?

May 30, 12:15:41 PDT> Alex: Susan, find me in the hallway ok?

May 30, 12:15:48 PDT> Susan 10b: ok

May 30, 12:15:54 PDT> Neville: I am on right now with Linux FF

May 30, 12:16:22 PDT> Alex: good to know, thanks Neville

May 30, 12:17:54 PDT> Katie Laird: So does the real power of a political blog lay in its ability provide like-minded politicos with a discussion forum? or just as a buzz generator?

May 30, 12:20:03 PDT> MikeCornfield: Increasingly, political blogs set the agenda for the mainstream agenda setters. Cable news networks, newspapers, and others rely on the blogs for story ideas.

May 30, 12:20:15 PDT> Katie Laird: Interesting - so in a way blogs are becoming news generators vs. just commentators?

May 30, 12:20:46 PDT> MikeCornfield: What remains to be seen is how nonprofits can increase their public profiles through blogger relations and by dangling "blog bait": information bloggers find irresistible.

May 30, 12:22:24 PDT> Tuesday Gutz: so now blogging is no longer being panned out by the mainstream guys. has it achieved total acceptance? i heard that they might censor some blogs in the future.

May 30, 12:22:32 PDT> MikeCornfield: The bloggers made news out of: Trent Lott's comments about Strom Thurmond, the Downing Street memos, and Stephen Colbert's speech to the WHite House Correspondents.

May 30, 12:23:02 PDT> MikeCornfield: Blogs on mainstream media sites will be edited. Don't know about government censorship...

May 30, 12:25:43 PDT> Tuesday Gutz: I dont know if these blogs (from mainstream media sites) will generate as much readership as an independent blog especially if its political in nature

May 30, 12:27:08 PDT> MikeCornfield: It's true that any blog which smells of corporate control will turn off blogosphere regulars.

May 30, 12:27:40 PDT> MikeCornfield: Same goes for government control, as with blogs by elected officials.

May 30, 12:28:13 PDT> Katie Laird: Is it a silly question to ask if a blog is still a blog if every entry is edited and run through by an editor like a mini-article?

May 30, 12:29:01 PDT> MikeCornfield: An edited blog which accepts commentary and links to other blogs and stays current with the news and discussion is still a blog, in my view.

May 30, 12:29:14 PDT> MikeCornfield: No, I haven't

May 30, 12:31:10 PDT> MikeCornfield: One of the big raps on political blogs is that they are all criticism and no constructive dialogue. What do you think?

May 30, 12:31:24 PDT> Susan 10b: theres an interesting debate in the real conference going on right now about whether a blog is a journalist or not

May 30, 12:31:48 PDT> Susan 10b: is a blogger a real journalist or not

May 30, 12:32:16 PDT> Susan 10b: interesting tension btw whether bloggers could replace tradtitional media

May 30, 12:32:20 PDT> Tuesday Gutz: There are some sites already managed by civil journalists. how do you think this is going to affect mainstream media?

May 30, 12:32:27 PDT> MikeCornfield: That's an easy one. If a blogger provides independent reporting, she's a journalist. By that standard, of course, many print and radio pundits aren't journalists, either.

May 30, 12:33:46 PDT> Susan 10b: ohmynews is a gr8 conflation of the two citizen media and tradtional editied media

May 30, 12:34:07 PDT> Tuesday Gutz: yes

May 30, 12:34:09 PDT> MikeCornfield: Mainstream media will stick with blogging if it captures ad revenue for them.

May 30, 12:34:22 PDT> MikeCornfield: OhMynews is amazing!

May 30, 12:34:27 PDT> Tuesday Gutz: and is it already capturing enough ad revenue!

May 30, 12:35:38 PDT> MikeCornfield: Too soon to tell about the profitability of blogging for mainstream media. It could work as niche advertising, and as part of a pay-per-click arrangement similar to what the search portals do.

May 30, 12:36:08 PDT> MikeCornfield: Of course, the big challenge to the revenues of mainstream media doesn't come from blogs, but from Craig'slist.

May 30, 12:36:53 PDT> Tuesday Gutz: oh yes, and craig list couldnt even explain this phenomenon

May 30, 12:37:38 PDT> MikeCornfield: I hope Craig (Newmark) is with you. He has a lot to offer the nonprofits, potentially.

May 30, 12:39:38 PDT> MikeCornfield: Next weekend a lot of big names in the Democratic Party are appearing at the YearlyKos conference sponsored by the biggest political blog of them all (in the US), DailyKos. Any of you going?

May 30, 12:41:37 PDT> Tuesday Gutz: Hmm, Im in Spain

May 30, 12:41:44 PDT> Tuesday Gutz: =)

May 30, 12:42:14 PDT> MikeCornfield: Lucky you.

May 30, 12:42:50 PDT> Tuesday Gutz: =)

May 30, 12:44:46 PDT> Katie Laird: http://www.yearlykos.org/

May 30, 12:44:46 PDT> Katie Laird: That does sound interesting - will you be there Mike?

May 30, 12:45:03 PDT> MikeCornfield: Unfortunately no. But it illustrates the power of F2F in a virtual world.

May 30, 12:46:31 PDT> MikeCornfield: I'm not aware of any blogger-sponsored conferences on the right. But a few of them have joined readers on cruise ships...

May 30, 12:48:53 PDT> Katie Laird: How effective do you think candidate blogs are? It seems like the A-List political bloggers are not really politicans themselves (or am I wrong?)

May 30, 12:49:11 PDT> MikeCornfield: No, you're right. The challenge of candidate blogs is two-fold: how do readers know the candidate is doing the blogging, and for those who do blog, is it the best use of their time?

May 30, 12:49:44 PDT> MikeCornfield: Howard Dean never blogged on his campaign blog, which was a good solution.

May 30, 12:49:44 PDT> Edward Vielmetti: I know a local blogger and politician here in Ann Arbor - Larry Kestenbaum, the county clerk and register of deeds. He's not so much a "political blogger" per se, though he is a regular contributor to local online news outlets

May 30, 12:49:44 PDT> Edward Vielmetti: he also runs the "political graveyard" site

May 30, 12:49:48 PDT> Edward Vielmetti: and posts all of the letters to his staff to his blog

May 30, 12:49:56 PDT> MikeCornfield: Yeah, for candidates and officials, doing guest posts on other blogs is the smart move. Political graveyard is a hoot...

May 30, 12:50:21 PDT> Tuesday Gutz: I dont think politicans should blog at all especially when its their own campaign, they dont have the credibility

May 30, 12:52:14 PDT> MJanofsky: Hey everyone! I'm Michael Janofsky, and I'll be your moderator for the next hour (beginning in about 10 minutes)

May 30, 12:52:56 PDT> MJanofsky: We should have Alexandra Samuel of Social Signal joining us to talk about "Building Online Community: Behind the Scenes at NetSquared"

May 30, 12:53:04 PDT> Alex: I'm here

May 30, 12:53:15 PDT> Alex: standing by whenever

May 30, 12:53:24 PDT> Alex: but looking forward to the rest of this session

May 30, 12:53:32 PDT> MJanofsky: Great!!

May 30, 12:54:58 PDT> Katie Laird: Mike - do you think that journalists also look to chat rooms / forums for news inspiration? Not quite the same as a blog.... but I"m interested in knowing how much consumer generated media in general is taken into account by the journalism world

May 30, 12:55:55 PDT> MikeCornfield: I think journalists discount consumer generated media because they aren't familiar with the individuals making the contributions.

May 30, 12:56:42 PDT> MikeCornfield: Journalists are attracted to celebrities, and political bloggers are the newest stars in the system, so to speak.

May 30, 12:58:14 PDT> Katie Laird: Any particular up and coming political bloggers to keep an eye on?

May 30, 12:59:04 PDT> Alex: Great question!

May 30, 12:59:20 PDT> MikeCornfield: Hmm, that's a good one. I can't think of one...but my guess is the latest influential blogger is probably blogging about immigration...en espanol!

May 30, 12:59:56 PDT> gillo: hi all

May 30, 13:00:15 PDT> MikeCornfield: I'm going to sign off now. This has been great fun and edifying. Best of luck with the conference. I'm at corn@gwu.edu if you want to continue the conversation...

May 30, 13:00:25 PDT> Alex: Michael, thanks so much for doing this!

May 30, 13:00:33 PDT> Katie Laird: Thanks a lot Mike!

May 30, 13:00:50 PDT> Tuesday Gutz: thanks a lot mike