Welcome Alistair Campbell

Thanks to Chris Paul who brings my attention to Alistair Campbell's brand new contribution to the digital age.

Alistair tells us that

I am a late convert http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gifto all this online malarkey but now the conversion has happened, I've decided to make a real go of it.

and adds that

I will blog when I feel like it, vlog at least once a week, give Dave Cameron the odd whack, and hopefully engage in a bit of lively debate. Tories welcome.

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

Can blogs help to engage the political process?

Labour Home has come in for a fair amount of criticism in recent days.

Suny Hundel who is the power behind Liberal Conspiracy notes that it along with its opposite number Conservative Home suffer from the same problem.The wishes of the party hierarchy to control from the top down.

He points out that a Fabian society debate

today revealed just how resistant the party hierarchy is to letting the grassroots help set the agenda. But that will have to change if Labour is to have a chance of winning the next election

. and adds that

We are now living in an era where people want more accountability and responsiveness from their elected officials. They are put off politics because they find it too Westminster-focused or irrelevant to their lives. They find the whole system difficult to decipher. In other words, they want more control, and want to engage with others who feel the same.

So the solution according to Suny is let blogs create the grassroots delay and if it is correctly it can

new ways of getting involved in the political process.

Labour Home gets a new backer

I hope that this news is correct.

Rumour has it among comrades that LabourHome has managed to financially seduce is none other than Mr Mike Danson, the new proprietor of the New Statesman, who has offered a high five figure sum for the site's funds... with some of the existing editors, like Alex Hilton, one of the foremost Labour bloggers and co-founder, Jag Singh, staying on board. Views from the bottom, cash and editorial from the top. Excellent

.

Great news if this is the case,and that hopefully with the backing of the New Statesman,the poliical blogosphere will have a left of centre rival to the excellent Conservative Home.

Hat Tip-Guido

Image from

http://www.crewe.tv/

Via Miranda Richardson

Here is a good example of a blog being used as a forum for political debate on a local issue.The Excellent Crewe blog managedto secure an interview with David Cameron on whta the author says was his 3rd visit to the constituency ahead of next weeks by election

Read the whole piece here

Not so neutral Total Politics

An interesting revelation in the New Statesman by Kevin McGuire.

Iain Dale's much flaunted new politics mag is to be bankrolled by none other than Lord Ashcroft.

Your correspondent discovered Dale squatting in Ashcroft's 7 Cowley Street basement lair when I paid an uninvited call to the Westminster block. Dale insisted the company was his, with Ashcroft a wealthy investor who'll play no editorial role. Yet I suspect the involvement of the moneybags right-winger, whose tax status remains an international mystery, will hinder Dale's attempt to present Total Ashcroft as "politically neutral

Bob Piper asks the question

Are there any other Tory bloggers getting a 'subsidy' from Ashcroft? (No, not you, newmania... he wouldn't be that daft)... for instance is that other 'independent free spirit Paul Staines also in receipt of Ashcroft gold? As MaGuire says... just exactly how big a hole does this blow in the claim that Total Ashcroft will be politically neutral?

Iain Dale talking to media Guardian replies

Ashcroft's cash would not influence the magazine's content.

A deal with the Tory peer had yet been signed, and any agreement would be purely a "commercial arrangement and Ashcroft's involvement would be a "huge compliment", said Dale.

The power of political blogging or not!!!!!

Via Adrian Monck

According to a survey by Harris interactive

A majority of Americans do not read political blogs, the online commentaries that have proliferated in the race for the U.S. presidency,
Only 22 percent of people responding to the poll said they read blogs regularly, meaning several times a month or more, according to the survey conducted by Harris Interactive.

But if you are talking to the older generation

While blogs are largely considered the realm of young people who are most Internet-savvy, only 19 percent of people ages 18 to 31, and 17 percent of those ages 32 to 43, regularly read a political blog, the poll said.
The generation most likely to read such blogs are those age 63 or older, 26 percent of whom said they do so. Also, 23 percent of those ages 44 to 62 read them, the poll said

What does this tell us.Younger people aren't interested in politics,no surprise there,or is it simply that older people have more time to surf the web?