It's official-Draper leaves Labour List

It was rumour but now it is official.

Derek Draper is leaving Labour List.This statement has appeared on the site

Two weeks ago I posted on LabourList and said I was sorry for my role in the Damian McBride affair. Of course I regret ever receiving the infamous email and I regret my stupid hasty reply. Instead I should have said straight away that the idea was wrong.
I do ask people to remember, though, that in the end its contents were never published by me or anyone else involved in the Labour party and they would never have seen the light of day were it not for someone hacking into my emails and placing them into the public domain. Because of that, what was a silly idea ultimately destined for the trash can became a national scandal. Nonetheless, I should have made clear they were unacceptable from the very beginning.
On a much smaller note I also think I got the tone of LabourList wrong sometimes, being too strident, aggressive and obsessed with the "blogosphere". Having said that I am proud that I was the founder of LabourList. It really was a Labour of love. In just over 100 days there have been nearly 250 contributors, over 500 posts and 18,000 comments. I’d like to think one day I’ll be judged on all of that rather than just one, admittedly awful, email.
What has become clear, though, is that my continued editorship can only detract from what LabourList needs to do now. That is why, after a couple of weeks of reflection, I am passing on the editorship to Alex Smith, who has been a very able Deputy to me from the beginning. I have no doubt that Alex will steer the site to bigger and better things and I urge everyone who wants Labour to have a vibrant, active space on the internet to give him your backing and get involved in whatever comes next.

Blogging wars and the end of Derek Draper

The Telegraph's front page story ths morning is going to cause a great deal of controversy across the political blogosphere this Easter weekend.

The paper reports that

Downing Street is at the centre of a fresh security scare after it emerged that private emails written by one of Gordon Brown’s senior officials had ended up in the hands of Guido Fawkes.

The paper adds that

The emails, which made a number of unfounded, innuendo-laden suggestions about the private lives of David Cameron, George Osborne and other Conservative MPs

The man in question believes the story to be somewhat of a plant and a continuation of his rtecent battle with Derek Draper and Damian McBride and refutes that he tried to sell the story to the Sunday papers.

Damian McBride is desperately trying to throw a smokescreen up tonight with a planted frontpage story in the Telegraph which downplays what he has been up to. Andrew Porter, the Telegraph’s lobby correspondent, is Damian McBride’s regular drinking companion and tame mouthpiece, so it is no surprise whatsoever to Guido that the Telegraph is being used by Downing Street for damage limitation./blockquote>

Meanwhile Iain Dale also involved in a blogging spat with Mr Draper

This week, Derek Draper's Twitter Feed and any mention of him have been removed from the front page of Labour List. I wonder if that is in preparation for him being dropped altogether.
I await the details of the Sunday papers, but I would be very surprised if either Damian McBride or Derek Draper still had the same job titles on Monday.

Guido v Draper

Have just caught up with the confrontation between Derek Draper and Paul Staines aka Guido on the Daily politics.

All I will say is that I hope people watching don't think that is what blogging is all about.

They have probably set back the cause of blogging in the eyes of both the public and the politicians.

Enough said !!!!!!!!!!!!!

Draper makes the Downfall video

It had to happen,the blogging events of the last couple of weeks are captured

Draper's site to launch

It has been confirmed that Derek Draper's Labour blog site Labourlist will launch this week.

The party have been in danger of being left behind in the blogosphere with the seeming success of Conservative Home and independent Tory bloggers such as Iain Dale.

According to the Guardian

Labour is fighting back in the battle of the blogs, with a new website to be launched this week aimed at sparking an online debate among what it calls "Labour-minded" people over thinking inside the movement. It forms part of Labour plans to "take the fight to the web", with ministers fielding questions in online forums, such as the price comparison website moneysupermarket.com and "virals" - internet spoofs designed to be emailed between friends - increasingly sitting alongside conventional party political broadcasts.

It remains to be seen whether Draper's site will emulate the success of the Tory Internet contributions.The site is to be run Independently of the party and by all accounts on a shoestring