Mike Arrington, HitWise, Gigaom and a bunch of other folks including me now all are talking about useless numbers comparing Google Blog Search to Technorati. Does anyone really care? I know I don’t. In fact I think they do entirely different things. I use technorati feeds more than anything. I use Google Blog Search when I’m bored out of my mind and am looking for something new. Comscore, Hitwise, Blogpulse, and Alexa are all pretty useless but they make great egoboosters when things are good, and can sure make you feel crappy when the numbers aren’t leaning your way.
Robert Bluey had a very interesting discussion with rumored Presidential hopeful Mitt Romney, the part that intrigued me was the side discussion on new media:
I think that the opinion leaders in the country, particularly those in primaries, are people who are very involved on the Internet and are watching the blogs and seeing what’s being said. They’re getting ahead of the news cycle by oftentimes weeks. And that kind of lead and that kind of awareness is very powerful in a primary setting, where the voters tend to be well informed and very involved in party politics.
Particularly in a primary kind of setting, you want to be very closely connected to the online world, to the blog world and make sure your perspectives are being understood, and that the misperceptions, which inevitably creep up, are being nipped in the bud. That’s something which, by virtue of the fact that I do not yet have an exploratory committee—that decision to file for that has not yet been reached—so I’ve sort of had to sit here and watch a lot going on without being able to respond and clean up some of the misperceptions that were out there. That’s something Stephen Smith is going to be able to do for us. I’m looking forward to that.
A small cluster of power bloggers — focused on politics, blogging and humor — were responsible for the top 100 blog posts for 2006, according to word-of-mouth measurement firm Nielsen BuzzMetrics. The top blog — based on the number of inbound links from other blogs between January 1 and November 30, 2006 — was mother.livejournal.com’s petition against changes in the livejournal interface. The single post was linked to in 801 posts by 786 other blogs.
“A minority of highly influential blogs continues to influence the broader conversation on the web,” said Jonathan Carson, CEO, Nielsen BuzzMetrics. “However, unique circumstances and events, such as the LiveJournal protest against proposed interface changes, can resonate with passionate stakeholders and catapult lesser-known blogs to the top.”
Being what I would consider a left leaning moderate conservative. I sometimes have a difficult time grasping either left or right sided political bloggers. A new documentary entitled Blog Wars aired tonight on The Sundance Channel and will air again on the 30th. It’s actually pretty good and hopefully a few people will understand blogging is about sharing our voice in a new age of media.
In 2004, political bloggers came of age. They propelled Howard Dean from fringe candidate to front-runner. They took on Dan Rather and won. And they charted the course for the “swiftboating” of John Kerry. As the 2006 mid-term elections approached, bloggers were preparing for battle again. Filmmakers James Rogan and Phil Craig’s sharp documentary examines how online democratic activism is shaping important elections by focusing on the decisive Connecticut senate race and Ned Lamont’s challenge to incumbent Joe Lieberman.
It seems that nowadays, every site that publishes content but is not endorsed or owned by a major mainstream media outlet is called a blog.
The Inquirer is taking this as a personal affront and has taken it upon itself to teach people more about blogs and blogging.
Let’s start with a definition, a blog is short for a web log, that is someone writing about their personal experiences, sometimes on a specific topic, sometimes not. Some are formatted in the classic blog way with text down the middle, others not. It all has one thing in common, it is a personal log of a single person’s experiences.
On the other hand if there is more than one person writing for a site, and if they are getting paid, it isn’t a blog.
John Edwards uses YouTube to announce his run for President. I’m a huge supporter of people who try to the right thing. I think John Edwards is that kind of guy. I don’t like to make official statements of support for political candidates. But if John Edwards is running. He’s got 901am’s support as I believe he really is trying to make a social difference, a moral difference, and a positive difference in bringing change to our world outside of normal political channels.
A young egyptian student was jailed for blogging. Expressing his opinions something people in many countries take for granted. Including me. The lesson here is that Kareem Amer believes that his right to share his voice and opinion is worth more than not having the ability to share his voice. Many of us who blog, or produce multimedia content need to think carefully how we use this technology. But more importantly we need to realize we are apart of a growing international community that finds hope in tools we take advantage of everyday along with our freedoms.
In a cramped jail cell in Alexandria, Egypt, sits a soft-spoken 22- year-old student. Kareem Amer was sent to prison for over a month for allegedly “defaming the president of Egypt” and “highlighting inappropriate aspects that harm the reputation of Egypt.” Where did Amer commit these supposed felonies? On his weblog.
In 2007 we should find new ways to support bloggers like Kareem Amer. Those who are being imprisoned for simply sharing their opinions that we can share freely.
Microsoft handed out a bunch of laptops to bloggers. They would like them back but only after a nice review, or passing them on to someone else who will review them. Not a bad plan. Our very own Chris Pearson received a chair in a similar fashion. And he really likes it. So does Deuce, the unofficial 901am mascot.
I’m just a bit jealous as I’ve never been sent anything. So if any reputable beer marketers, mead manufacturers, or furniture companies want to send me products I will be more than happy to review them and consume them.
According to TechCrunch PayPerPost has acquiredsome of the Performancing.com assets. First off I’m not certain this even will honestly salvage Performancing or PayPerPost. It’s like one sinkingl venture buying another sinking venture. The money had run out at Performancing I’m sure as the funding was probably limited to one of its founders and some money it was making from ad revenue.
Apparently the ad network, and the firefox plugin will not be sold. Ok those were the two most valuable assets IMO. So basically PayPerPost bought Performancing Metrics, which was a half decent tracking client for blogs, and it bought access to the 28,000 bloggers in the Performancing Community.
I’m not sure if this really benefits the Performancing Community any, in fact I think it signals a quick end to it. And I also think it sends a signal that the Performancing Ad Network is a bust. Something I saw pretty vividly from the start. Especially they were essentially trying to compete with Google as far as micromonetizing small publishers.
The only good thing I see in all of this is a potential spinoff of the Performancing for Firefox Plugin. I really disagree with Tony Hung in thinking this is huge news for either one of these sinking ships.
Andrew Baron of Rocketboom fame will launch a videoblogging studio. Abbey Corps will be more than a network to sell ads. It will provide a full background of support services for content creators by creating community.
According to Andrew Baron:
When the emphasis is shifted towards supporting great quality content and the options for monetizing that content remain open to outside partnerships and community support (as well as our own in-house options), the health of the organization and thus the quality of the content can continue to grow in the most natural direction.
Robert Bluey had a very interesting discussion with rumored Presidential hopeful Mitt Romney, the part that intrigued me was the 
A young egyptian student was jailed for blogging. Expressing his opinions something people in many countries take for granted. Including me. The lesson here is that Kareem Amer believes that his right to share his voice and opinion is worth more than not having the ability to share his voice. Many of us who blog, or produce multimedia content need to think carefully how we use this technology. But more importantly we need to realize we are apart of a growing international community that finds hope in tools we take advantage of everyday along with our freedoms. 
Microsoft handed out a
According to TechCrunch 
Andrew Baron of Rocketboom fame will launch a videoblogging studio. 
