You've forgotten Lenin's Tomb <http://leninology.blogspot.com/>. Are there other bloggers here?
>And people are talking about "comrades," "Marxists," even
>self-defined "revolutionaries" . . . . ending up doing what all the
>navel centered lib-labs are doing by the legions. Me, me, me, ME,
>ME, ME, ME... (can I get a bigger font?)
>
>Very collectivist indeed!
A blog doesn't have to be an individual's journal, however. You can create a "collectivist blog," if you will, and coordinate it with individual blogs.
Narcosphere is a good example:
What Is The Narcosphere?
The Narcosphere - it appears online at http://narcosphere.narconews.com/ - is a participatory, online, forum, where readers and journalists come together to discuss, correct, add new information and relevant links, and debate the work of the journalists who publish on NarcoNews.com.
The Narcosphere is similar to other forums on the Internet that utilize a software named Scoop (Kuro5hin and The Daily Kos are two of the more popular examples), but with some new twists.
First big change: We're doing away with the anonymity that historically has dominated the Internet. This is not a blanket rejection or critique of anonymity: There are still countless places online where people who choose to remain anonymous can do that, and we consider many of those forums, such as Indymedia, to be in harmony with ours. But to participate in The Narcosphere we all must sign our comments with our full name. After all, this is about journalism. Honesty and accountability are the hallmarks of Authentic Journalism, and so the price of admission includes honesty and accountability by all.
Second big change: The readers shall, from tonight onward, be the copublishers of this newspaper. We are surrendering more control than any other newspaper we know of to the copublishers. For four years I have published Narco News, and I remain as editor-in-chief of the "classic Narco News" side of this newspaper: the reported stories by Authentic Journalists throughout América. But The Narcosphere will involve the copublishers in correcting, commenting, criticizing, and bringing new and relevant information and context to each story. Every report on Narco News will now serve as a "first draft" of immediate history, and the copublishers will expand upon each report, deepen the inquiry, ask pointed questions, suggest new leads, and often do investigative reporting themselves. Every reported story on the "classic Narco News" side of the publication will have a thread of comments on The Narcosphere side. It is time for the readers to start driving the coverage of news.
Third big change: It is time for journalists to start "blogging." Most Commercial Media do not allow their reporters to maintain weblogs without censoring them. We wish to launch a conversation between our journalists and our readers, so that both groups may learn from the other, and be enriched in a better understanding about how the two sides of the journalistic divide - producer and consumer - view journalism and news. Over the coming days and weeks, we'll be introducing our "journo-blogs" (we call them Reporters' Notebooks), and the journalists behind them, to the readers. And we will also, of course, be introducing our readers to the journalists. We do beg everyone's patience on one key factor: Many of our journalists do not speak every language in our Narcosphere. Some only speak Spanish. Others speak only Portuguese. Others, still, speak only English. Still others are new to "Internet language" such as html code. The process of translating, rapidly, these conversations is going to be a daunting task and will take some time to develop. But this kind of translation - not only of words, but of cultures and concepts that are distinct in different lands - offers one of the great promises and potentials of The Narcosphere: breaking the information blockades across language barriers and cultures.
Fourth big change: To become a copublisher, you have to show, and maintain, good faith toward the other copublishers and the project. The Internet is overflowing with commentators that are often called "trolls," whose main goal is, too often, the derailment of the project. Our break from anonymity solves a large part of that problem. This is how we solve the rest of it: Copublishers are, in a sense, investors, except the rules are distinct from those of Wall Street. To qualify for a copublisher account you have to invest. For journalists, that means writing news stories and columns that rise to Authentic Journalism standards of publication. We already count with dozens of journalists who have received scholarships from, or taught at, the Narco News School of Authentic Journalism, or who have published their work on Narco News. Each of them is already in the door. For readers, that means investing your money or your time in the project. The fastest, easiest, way to qualify for your copublisher account is to make a donation to The Fund for Authentic Journalism, which is supporting this project. Or you can donate your labor (by translating or by contributing your talents in some other way that we consider a substantial, non-monetary, contribution). Copublishers have to abide by a few simple rules to keep us legal and never boring. Violating those minimal rules (no partisan electoral campaigning, no financial solicitations, that sort of thing) are grounds for losing a copublisher account.
Fifth big change: Copublishers will largely regulate each other, and will do it collectively. You will be able to "rate" (or vote on) the value of each comment made. Comments and Reporters' Notebook entries that receive the highest votes will be linked from page one of Narco News, and in the center column of The Narcosphere. We don't know of any other project in journalism that allows readers to place stories on the front page, but we think it's a necessary step in the Authentic Journalism renaissance. I believe it is so important that I am surrendering that power to the copublishers. Those copublishers who participate consistently and who receive high ratings from other copublishers will be granted "trusted user status," and those copublishers will be able to vote to "hide" comments that they feel are made in bad faith. They'll also be able to vote to take an unfairly hidden comment and place it back in public view.
Obviously, we are just beginning with so many new features, and this process will involve some trial and error. We'll be updating and evolving based on our lived experience with this project. Copublishers and readers will be involved in guiding the direction. . . .
<http://narcosphere.narconews.com/story/2004/2/16/175416/747> -- Yoshie
* Critical Montages: <http://montages.blogspot.com/> * Bring Them Home Now! <http://www.bringthemhomenow.org/> * Calendars of Events in Columbus: <http://sif.org.ohio-state.edu/calendar.html>, <http://www.freepress.org/calendar.php>, & <http://www.cpanews.org/> * Student International Forum: <http://sif.org.ohio-state.edu/> * Committee for Justice in Palestine: <http://www.osudivest.org/> * Al-Awda-Ohio: <http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Al-Awda-Ohio> * Solidarity: <http://www.solidarity-us.org/>