Bloggers

The new media model needs broader base:

If the residents of North Carolina are to access the information they need to be citizens, we must find a way to foster new and diverse tributaries of news and information to flow into the mainstream media.

Tributaries include small, start-up news operations, hyperlocal papers, blogs and nonprofits that produce information as part of their mission. Anyone who commits acts of journalism can contribute to the flow of high-quality information.

I love that "acts of journalism" thing. You are what you do, right?

A couple of days ago I mentioned that I was interviewed by Amanda Millner-Fairbanks of the New York Times for a feature. She told me that it was likely to run Sunday, but it actually published today on its web site.  It will be in the print edition tomorrow (on page ST1 of the New York edition).

The article, "The Year of the Political Blogger Has Arrived," is about bloggers and the 2008 Democratic National Convention, focusing on some of the logistical and financial hurdles faced by bloggers to cover the event. She also spoke with the DNCC about the challenges of including new media/citizen journalists as members of the credentialed media.

Other bloggers are interviewed, including Phillip Anderson from The Albany Project and John Odum of Green Mountain Daily.

Welcome back to another installment of UP News. The guys in this interview are indeed, card carrying liberals, and not only that, they are the ones coordinating events for the Big Tent event for Bloggers in Denver for the Convention.
John Erhardt and Aaron Silverstein are my kind of activists. Both are Editors for Square State, which is one of the main blogs in Colorado. Additionally, Aaron is with Democrats Work and will be organizing the Delegates for Actions in Denver the week of the convention. John is the state coordinator of Living Liberally/Drinking Liberally
and is putting the fun in the Big Tent Event by getting some top notch food, bands and events. I will be there with my brother in law, Tomas Custer, who runs Hispanic Tips and who was interviewed here on NPR.

Yearly Kos is an annual event bringing bloggers together from across the nation for a weekend of organizing, activism, networking, and progressive infrastructure building. The deadline to buy tickets is July 14 for the August 2-5 convention.

I've been asked to moderate the NC "caucus" and co-lead a regional gathering as well, so I'm asking the BlueNC community. Who's coming to Yearly Kos? You can respond here or use the BlueNC mail.

Lots more about Yearly Kos after the jump.

Where have you gone, Joe DiMaggio?
Or, This Looks Like a Job for …By Wayne Goodwin

I remember quite vividly as a child and teenager eagerly poring over the usual action comic books expected to be on the reading lists of all American boys. Superman, Batman, Spiderman, Green Lantern, The Flash. Their adventures fighting against evil and for the usual “truth, justice, and the American way” certainly helped provide the escapism one needs at that age.

I watched the promotional video from last year, and I saw six Black people among 1,500 participants.

Cross posted at the Francis L. Holland Blog, MyDD, and Culture Kitchen.

Today, I came across a link to a publicity video for YearlyKos, an annual confernece of Democratic Party leftist anti-war bloggers, and I watched the entire video to confirm a suspicion:  That YearlyKos is an overwhelmingly white gathering - disproportionately white considering the number of Blacks in the Democratic Party.  http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=

-1234580617661540850&q=Mark+Bowllan  Watch the film for yourselves and tell me if my perceptions are in error.

Crossposted from Town Called Dobson


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Yesterday's strip was about how John Edwards' lack of backbone in the whole blogger fiasco brought me back to when Congress was filled with do-nothing Democrats. Feeble and weak these Democrats were and over and over they allowed the Bush Administration to roll over them and then they apologized for being in the way.

The Vatican has been involved in some pretty nasty things, but its recent positions are still horrid. This is a group that is actively seeking to block women from gaining access to birth control, sanctioning Gay bigotry and is against many of the same agenda items that Edwards claims he is for such as stem cell research, reproductive freedom and equality. So why the fuck did he let a slime ball like Bill Donahue get away with the blogger bashing? This is the same guy who wanted to deny John Kerry Communion due to his voting record on pro-choice legislation. It wasn't like Donahue is analogous to Billy Graham, but more on the side of Oral Roberts.

Crossposted from Town Called Dobson


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Ed Cone today raises a question about religiosity that will be with us for a good long while. It is grounded in the tempest in a teapot caused when a hate-mongering Catholic took issue with the fact that an Edwards blogger wasn't sufficiently reverential of his particular brand of mythology around the virgin birth.

The tempest has, of course, made its way into the mainstream media, where even old newspaper guys are weighing in with shrill opinions.