Top 100 Political Blogs
Tory self-publicist and feted King of Blogging Iain Dale has decreed the race for the top 100 UK political blogs for 2008-9 open.
Last year Iain got a good deal of stick for his method of compiling the top 100 centre left blogs. Dave Complex and John Angliss pointed out that Iain had circulated an email asking respondents to name their top Labour blogs, which he subsequently went on to label ‘centre left’. So not only did we see a Labour right-winger like Luke Akehurst weigh in at number 10, but also juvenile tat like General Theory of Rubbish came in way above popular socialist blogs like Socialist Unity and Lenin’s Tomb by virtue of being known by the right people. This wouldn’t matter if the rankings were just a bit of fun, but as we know the book spun off the list has become something of a reference work for political blogging in Britain. When it came to the combined top 100 list Andy noted that the bias in Iain’s method allowed him to run with the spurious argument that left blogging is nowhere as vibrant or well read as the right’s, nor is there any alternative to consensus politics.
Thankfully this year it looks like Iain has taken on board these criticisms and completely changed the way positions are determined. To quote,
We’re asking for your votes to decide the Top 100 UK Political Blogs. Simply email your Top Ten (ranked from 1 to 10) to toptenblogs@totalpolitics.com . If you have a blog, please encourage your readers to do the same. I’ll then compile the Top 100 from those that you send in. Just order them from 1 to 10. Your top blog gets 10 points and your tenth gets 1 point. The deadline for submitting your Top 10 is Friday August 15th. Please type Top 10 in the subject line.
So now the left has an opportunity to redress the balance and produce a more representative list. As a respecter of democratic processes I’m not going to be asking readers to vote early and often, but if you do like this humble blog you know what to do.
Postscript: It seems you can only vote for blogs listed in the Total Politics Blog Directory.
Well, hope to see more women and feminist bloggers……
Comment by Louise — 23 July, 2008 @ 11:51 am
why bother about competitions like these?
Comment by Entdinglichung — 23 July, 2008 @ 1:45 pm
Weirdly they have several left of Labour blogs down under the Labour supporting category and not in the left wing category on the Total Politics site. Don’t forget the Green category too.
Even more weirdly they have Harry’s Place under the Left wing section and not under Labour supporters.
Comment by Ed — 23 July, 2008 @ 3:19 pm
I’m sure you’ll be disappointed (but not at all surprised) to learn that ‘voting by email’ was added as an afterthought.
Iain didn’t even realise that accepting anonymous votes under comments might not be a good idea until someone pointed it out to him. Even now, it appears that you can leave an anonymous vote under comments so long as you ‘give a name’.
Personally, I’ve never taken part in this charade. I’ve felt that doing so would lend it credibility that it doesn’t deserve.
Nothing has changed this year. Iain Dale is a fraud, a cheat and a bald-faced liar…
http://www.bloggerheads.com/archives/2008/04/this_is_spinal.asp
…and I refuse to legitimise his annual chart scam in any way.
Comment by Tim Ireland — 23 July, 2008 @ 6:30 pm
So - let’s all buy in to male-generated and male-dominated artificial hierarchies again, shall we?
That’s socialist how, exactly?
Comment by palau — 24 July, 2008 @ 9:51 am
Comrades should get off their high horses for a moment.
The list is widely publicised online and in print once it has been made available.
It has been conceived and publicised by the biggest Tory blog in the land, and will somewhat be skewed toward right-wing blogs.
But is this not a good opportunity to get left blogs and socialist ideas out to a wider audience?
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