My review of Colin Campbell's blog is up over at The Last Ditch.
Sunday, January 07, 2007
Blogpower Testimonials: The Headmaster himself
My review of "Nourishing Obscurity" by our leader James Higham is up at the Last Ditch.
Friday, January 05, 2007
Blogpower – let’s keep a cool head over this
Blogpower began because a group of bloggers agreed with the sentiments expressed by another blogger. It grew from there and if I may quote from The Cityunslicker and we know that many others endorse the opinion:
Blog power has been great for me, seeing new blogs and building traffic.
It is essentially democratic and to reiterate Voltaire’s Maxim:
I disapprove of what you say but I will defend to the death your right to say it. [S.G. Tallentyre 1759]
The Spicy Cauldron put it this way:
"The inclusion of sites on this list does not mean I endorse their opinions. Neither does it mean they endorse mine. We simply agree that something has to be done to address the domination of the blogosphere by just a few monolithic blogs."
So what’s happened? Why do some people want to pull out because a certain person is on the roll? Surely we’re losing sight of all the work, of all our visiting of each other and so on. Of what we’re really about.
Blogpower cannot be controlled by one person, it does not endorse any political view whatsoever so how could it be held accountable for representing anything? It is a tool for democracy in the blogosphere. That’s all.
There is no doubt that certain people are being e-mailed or called and it’s being suggested that Blogpower is ‘associating itself’ with an anathema organization. What tosh. Do our American, Canadian and Australian members think that? They probably wouldn’t even know what the British members are going on about.
Blogpower has become an international community of small to medium bloggers who try to get round to as many other members’ blogs as we can. There are blogs on the roll we’d never visit in a million years. Just as there are in the telephone directory.
Admittedly though, the issue is that the roll sits in our sidebar. So, rather than throwing the baby out with the bathwater, please make your views known. Then we formulate our policy on the basis of those views.
What we have here, with Blogpower, is true democracy in action. If you don’t like something, speak about it and we’ll change it. But let's not allow the fruit of our efforts to disintegrate over one man.
Blog power has been great for me, seeing new blogs and building traffic.
It is essentially democratic and to reiterate Voltaire’s Maxim:
I disapprove of what you say but I will defend to the death your right to say it. [S.G. Tallentyre 1759]
The Spicy Cauldron put it this way:
"The inclusion of sites on this list does not mean I endorse their opinions. Neither does it mean they endorse mine. We simply agree that something has to be done to address the domination of the blogosphere by just a few monolithic blogs."
So what’s happened? Why do some people want to pull out because a certain person is on the roll? Surely we’re losing sight of all the work, of all our visiting of each other and so on. Of what we’re really about.
Blogpower cannot be controlled by one person, it does not endorse any political view whatsoever so how could it be held accountable for representing anything? It is a tool for democracy in the blogosphere. That’s all.
There is no doubt that certain people are being e-mailed or called and it’s being suggested that Blogpower is ‘associating itself’ with an anathema organization. What tosh. Do our American, Canadian and Australian members think that? They probably wouldn’t even know what the British members are going on about.
Blogpower has become an international community of small to medium bloggers who try to get round to as many other members’ blogs as we can. There are blogs on the roll we’d never visit in a million years. Just as there are in the telephone directory.
Admittedly though, the issue is that the roll sits in our sidebar. So, rather than throwing the baby out with the bathwater, please make your views known. Then we formulate our policy on the basis of those views.
What we have here, with Blogpower, is true democracy in action. If you don’t like something, speak about it and we’ll change it. But let's not allow the fruit of our efforts to disintegrate over one man.
Thursday, January 04, 2007
First threat to Blogpower
Things had been going swimmingly but into it has swum trouble.
An issue has arisen which we had desperately hoped would not arise – the dragging of the Blogpower initiative into politics. We in no way endorse ANY view, political or religious of any kind. We are merely a co-operative, a confederation for mutual support. At any time there are going to be blogs on that list, by its very free nature, which we violently disagree with and we have every right to do as we wish on our own sites to deal with them – block them, whatever.
Blogpower is above politics and has nothing whatever to do with that process. Ian draws our attention to Spicy Cauldron, who has an interesting formulation:
An issue has arisen which we had desperately hoped would not arise – the dragging of the Blogpower initiative into politics. We in no way endorse ANY view, political or religious of any kind. We are merely a co-operative, a confederation for mutual support. At any time there are going to be blogs on that list, by its very free nature, which we violently disagree with and we have every right to do as we wish on our own sites to deal with them – block them, whatever.
Blogpower is above politics and has nothing whatever to do with that process. Ian draws our attention to Spicy Cauldron, who has an interesting formulation:
"The inclusion of sites in this list does not mean I endorse their opinions. Neither does it mean they endorse mine. We simply agree that something has to be done to address the domination of the blogosphere by just a few monolithic blogs."
To this end we have hastily drafted a Manifesto which we would like, in our recently established tradition, to open to your comment and/or amendment:
"We, the members of Blogpower, form a co-operative based on our shared goal of challenging the domination of the blogosphere by just a few monolithic blogs. We are resolutely non-monolithic, and regularly disagree strongly amongst ourselves. We accept that some readers may find some of the opinions expressed by Blogpower members objectionable, but ask that we not be judged collectively: any opinion expressed belongs solely to the poster. We uphold the principle of free speech. You are cordially invited to express your own views in the comment thread to any post. Membership of Blogpower is open to anyone, regardless of nationality, sexual orientation, political belief, party affiliation, religious outlook, or any other factors not specified here. Membership requires only that the Blogpower manifesto, including this amendment, be accepted at least in spirit."
Further to this, we’re well aware that some groups are attempting to turn us into a pro this or pro that group. Again, we are not a group. We are individuals who have decided to help each other out. Let's let cool heads prevail for now until we have made our stance clear, then make your decision, yea or nay. But give this initiative, which has taken quite some work from many people to get up, a chance first.
We invite your comments.
Blogpower stats 18:45, London time today:
Last 100 visitors84% are coming directly to the site, as distinct from coming to one specific page. Referrals were from everywhere. As you’d imagine, 96% were English speaking, the other 4% coming from Russia, Italy and France.
Firefox 2.X was 33% and the old IE6 was only 15%. IP addresses dominated with 54%, followed by a host of others. Windows XP dominated, on 81% and Mac was on 13%.
Visitors
Total 736
Average Per Day 41
Hits
Total 1,175
Average Per Day 63
This Week 439
Blogpower Testimonials: Is this up to date?
So, Cityunslicker has done 10, I've done my first 10, Tiberius Gracchus, I believe, has done one although I can't find it, Tom's into his, Spicy Cauldron has done one, I think. Anyone else we haven't mentioned? Keep up the good work, Blogpowerers.
Wednesday, January 03, 2007
Blogpower Testimonials: The CityUnslicker
My next step towards fulfilling our leader's assignment is now available at The Last Ditch. Enjoy.
Tuesday, January 02, 2007
Blogpower Testimonials: Bel is Thinking
In a typically lawyerly fashion I have overdone the instructions from our leader. A paragraph each on 10 other Blogpower bloggers has turned into a rather fuller review of each of 10. This is a work in progress and may take a week or two to complete. However the first of the ten is up over at my blog. I hope you enjoy it.
Monday, January 01, 2007
Blog testimonials
In an earlier post I asked people to write up maybe ten lines on other bloggers with a view to the 'written-about-person' being able to use them as he or she wishes - maybe on their sidebars. As we don't get MSM comment, this must surely be just as good - assessment by our peers. The Cityunslicker was first and I've been very slow but now my first ten are ready.
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