January 04, 2005
Pew: Politics Drives Blog Growth In 2004
GUEST: Jack O'Toole
Hi, folks. My name is Jack O'Toole, and Buzz has asked me (along with some other fine ladies and gentlemen you'll be meeting soon) to join him in the daily task of keeping you up to date on all the latest happenings in the world of the Internet and politics. I can only say here at the outset that it's both a pleasure and a distinct honor to have been invited to play in Buzz's sandbox, and I sincerely hope that I'm able to hold up under the weight of his rather outsized expectations. (As I recall, said expectations were communicated in the form of a barked request along the lines of, "Geez, Jack, just start posting already, wouldja??!!" So you can see what I'm up against here....)
Anyway, let's get started, shall we?
According to a new study by the Pew Foundation, blog creation and readership grew sharply in the United States last year, primarily as a result of the hotly contested presidential race.
Twenty-seven percent of online adults in the United States said in November they read blogs, compared with 17 percent in a February survey by the Pew Internet and American Life Project....
Earlier in the year [before the tsunami], politics was what drove readers to blogs.
Democrat Howard Dean embraced blogs early, allowing supporters from around the country to organize and talk about the campaign informally, without needing to clear remarks with campaign headquarters. Many bloggers who supported his campaign provided links for readers to easily make campaign contributions over the Internet.
Even after Dean's campaign fizzled, bloggers continued to pundit, and a handful were invited to cover the Democratic and Republican national conventions for the first time.
Time magazine even named its first Blog of the Year, crediting the Power Line blog created by three lawyers for challenging mainstream media and questioning the validity of documents behind a "60 Minutes" report on President Bush's National Guard service. CBS News anchor Dan Rather later apologized for airing the report.
"Blogs have been around for several years, but because of the coverage in the political campaign, a lot more people became aware of the idea of blogging and certainly went online to read blogs," Rainie said.
POSTSCRIPT: You'll find the Pew report available for download here.
MORE: Media exec (and blog guru) Jeff Jarvis has a typically insightful take on the subject.
Posted by Jack O'Toole at January 4, 2005 10:37 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)
Comments
Jack
It's great to have you on the blog and who else should be the first 'guest blogger' but you.
FYI to our readers, Jack has been constructively 'hanging around' PoliticsOnline since before Day 1 and his insight and ideas have been a true inspiration to us over the years.
Posted by: Phil Noble at January 4, 2005 11:24 AM
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