Citizen Journalism HuffPo Style

Any takers from Connecticut's Blogoshere in helping in this Citizen Journalism project to provide coverage of the election campaigns?

OffTheBus:
HuffPost's Citizen Journalism Project Gets A Name, and Gets Rolling Here's an update on the exciting new citizen journalism project Huffington Post is launching. Read More

Just a quick explanation of what they are hoping to accomplish from Arianna Huffington:

At the end of March, I told you about the exciting new citizen journalism project Huffington Post is launching in partnership with NYU professor Jay Rosen and his experimental site, NewAssignment.Net. (If you missed it, read about it here and here).

It's time for an update. For starters, the project now has a name and an expected birth date.

We're calling it Off The Bus (OffTheBus.Net), a name that captures the essence of what we're looking to accomplish. Our disparate mix of citizen reporters won't be part of the mainstream pack covering the campaigns -- and will come at it from a wide range of different angles and perspectives, adding a new dimension to campaign journalism. Click here to sign up to become one of them.

In my travels, I've heard so many people express dissatisfaction with the way campaigns are covered -- especially with the obsession with the horse-race aspect of modern politics. Instead of looking at which candidate has made the most interesting national security proposal or who the candidates surround themselves with as advisers, we get endless discussions of who's up, who's down, who's gaining traction, and who's losing it. In short, the majority of today's political coverage has become a dissection of the latest polls. Reporters have become every bit as poll-driven as candidates.

The Undisputed Queen of Blogtopia Speaks

Arianna Huffington, owner of THE BIGGEST POLITICAL BLOG in the Blogosphere, discusses growing pains:

It's still the same place, with the same address, the same mission, and the same attitude that has always made HuffPost such a great read. It's just that now there is much more of it to love. And to organize it all we've created five new sections: Media, Business, Entertainment, a culture and lifestyle section called Living Now, and a Politics section that will feature our political editor Tom Edsall and a shared-content partnership with Josh Marshall and Talking Points Memo. Plus, we've improved the design, navigation, and search function to help you find what you want more easily. The front page will continue to feature our signature group blog and breaking news stories, but it was clearly no longer big enough to contain all the great stories, blog posts, and features we wanted to share with you. So each new section will have its own "front page" with fresh editorial talent and a constantly growing list of bloggers.

It is nice to hear that HuffPo is growing and improving. HuffPo has quickly grown to be the most read and linked political Blog on the net:


Traffic graph comparison key of some of the major players in the Blogosphere via Alexa:
Huffington Post, Crooks and Liars, dailyKos, Talking Points Memo, and Firedoglake.

It appears that more recently BOTH Crooks and Liars and Huffpo has been outperforming dKos traffic wise, but the Huffington Post took over the number one spot not long after they started publishing online in 2005.

Another thing to notice is that HuffPo has added the number 4 Blog, TPM, to its stable of contributors, while John Amato of the currently number 2 Blog in Blogtopia has been a long time contributor over there. I know that Firedoglake writers, like Jane Hamsher, also participate at HuffPo, and there are probably a dozen Blogs that probably come in around their rankings. I included them since they help to demonstrate just how HUGE HuffPo has become because Firedoglake is pretty darn big on their own.

Arianna, by any standards, has long since surpassed everyone on the net and is undeniably the Queen of Blogtopia and the Blogging universe right now. The Huffington Post is fast becoming a force to be reckoned with by any journalistic standards.

A side note: There may be other BIG BLOGS that would figure in this comparison well so don't feel slighted if I didn't use yours as an example here. It is just that I am pretty sure that those are the lefty blogs I, and others, read the most in the national Blogosphere. Well... Except for Kos, who seems to have recently lost his fucking mind. And, of course, skippy coined Blogtopia! :)