Monday, June 02, 2008

Where the MSM and the Blogosphere Become One

I have never been someone who believes the blogosphere and the mainstream media should be at each other's throats. I suppose I would say that, wouldn't I, seeing as I earn my living from various MSM outlets nowadays. There's an increasing overlap, whereby bloggers are now writing for and appearing on the MSN with increaed regularity and mainstream jourbalists are now blogging. It's very interesting to read Guido's post today on the subject of the number of people who visit various websites. Guido is more of a confrontationalist on this than me, as you will see in his post HERE.

I must say I do find it incredible that one man bands like him and me seem to be getting higher or equivalent numbers of readers (based on absolute unique visitors) than big MSM companies like ITN or the main political parties. Guido got 102,000 last month and I got 72,000. According to ComScore this is what other sites achieved during February...

BBC News UK Politics 1,090,000
itn.co.uk 96,000
theyworkforyou.com 69,000
Guardian Politics 67,000 (excl CiF)
barackobama.com 56,000
conservatives.com 40,000
bnp.org.uk 37,000
democraticunderground.com 32,000
labour.org.uk 29,000

Obvously those figures may have increased since February, but the trend is clear. Now all we need to do is generate direct income so we can market our blogs better.

24 comments:

Anonymous said...

"I must say I do find it incredible that one man bands like him and me seem to be getting higher or equivalent numbers of readers (based on absolute unique visitors) than big MSM companies like ITN or the main political parties."

Of course it is not incredible!!!

These organisations you cite are full of Stalinists. The last thing they want is people like me appearing on their patch and challenging their cosy left-wing liberal aetheist world view, so I am banned.

Also, you do not perpetuate lies. The MSM, such as the BBC do. Not only that, they encourage their employees to do so.

Also, you accept criticism, far more than any of the jumped up little prats who pose as columnists for the Times or the Guardian.

It is impossible to show any real degree of dissent - they simply don't print it.

Openness and freedom is your strength. These people are voting with their mice.

Warning: When you were "thinking" of being a PPC I did notice a certain amount of "caution" creeping in. Thankfully, you soon got back to being gossipy, mischievous and fun.

Anonymous said...

As much as I enjoy the blogosphere, as an amateur blogger myself, I think the numbers you present are not representative of the current situation. People get their news and opinions from TV, radio and press. When online they look for other sources and those are blogs (in part thanks to you and Guido). But obviously off-line news consumption is not recorded by Comscore. Still, very impressive numbers from you two.

Anonymous said...

Guido Fawkes? Isn't he that drunk driver without insurance who is currently tagged? I don't think he sets a good example in anything.

Anonymous said...

Democraticunderground is right up your street. Top Ten Conservative Idiots? Ground breaking stuff.

Anonymous said...

Great numbers Iain, and well deserved.

Max
http://theerrorlog.blogspot.com

Letters From A Tory said...

If you can beat Obama so easily, maybe you should be McCain's VP?

Anonymous said...

anonymous 4.03:

Aren't you that git who tells us things everyone already knew?

Anyway, shouldn't you be doing your homework now?

Blackacre said...

Blogs and MSM serve completely differing purposes so I cannot see how they can be compared. I read you and the other blogs I turn to (which are across the political spectrum) because I like you writing style and find what you have to say interesting. As a non-Tory, it is good to read someone whose views I often disagree with to find out what the intelligent Tories think on some points.

I read newspapers to get the news which I would not get from blogs alone. MSM blogs lack the single personality that you and the other good bloggers have and until they do so, you will remain ahead. If they do get more popular, then so what - ultimately I am not turned on by stat porn and could not care less if you get 1,000 or 100,000 "uniques" or whatever horrible term they use.

Shaun said...

Direct income for websites is the holy grail; the problem is that until a viable system for micro payments exists, its going to be tricky to see how you can do it (bar a bit of advertising) as the subscription-content model will kill you doublequick for all sorts of reasons (not least restricting your readership).

That your blogosphere 'celebrity' has value as an MSM talking head seems perfectly logical.

The novel thing here is that the route into being a commentator didn't involve spending years on the media-treadmill. To that extent its a democratisation of a previously closed-shop and congrats on doing that!

Anonymous said...

"Now all we need to do is generate direct income so we can market our blogs better".

Aaaah. The man who can make money from niche blogs will be the next Bill Gates.

Anonymous said...

I suspect that wrinkled weasel's definition of a Stalinist is anyone who dares to disagree with his world-view.

Anonymous said...

"Now all we need to do is generate direct income so we can market our blogs better".

Aaaah. The man who can make money from niche blogs will be the next Bill Gates.

BNPELECTIONRESULTS said...

define unique visitor...


everytime I turn the computer on, i become a unique visitor thanks to bt broadband... as they dont assign me the same IP number each time I switch off... A lot of these figures could easily be slashed if looked into.

Interesting to see the BNP as the hughest political site ?

Anonymous said...

7:24pm

Only if you switch your router off. Otherwise you have the same IP address until you do - pretty much.

Anonymous said...

"everytime I turn the computer on, i become a unique visitor thanks to bt broadband... as they dont assign me the same IP number each time I switch off..."

That's lucky, because the figure isn't arrived at using IP information. It uses Cookies.

Of course cookies can be deleted which can also distort the numbers but *most* people don't routinely delete their cookies (although I'd guess a minority do).

You might want to visit here for more info.

Anonymous said...

Why do you not include comment is free. You should include it. It is most popular and no one is preapred to admitt that. You write for it. So why hide that fact.

Anonymous said...

Guido and your blog is worth reading just for the funny comments. Given the politically correct/stalinist rubbish that passes for comedy these days on the BBC we need to get our laughs from somewhere.

Unknown said...

Great numbers, since however they are calculated the comparison with the MSM sites is stark.

But the question of turning eyeballs into revenue is interesting. Clearly, Google adwords are not going to make you rich and there does not appear to be a huge market for a premium ad network based around political blogs - either that or Messagespace needs some serious pepping up.

In your case, Iain, you would have to include a percentage of your appearance fees etc as "blog income" on the basis your profile is much higher as a result, but I guess that is not going to keep your Audi in unleaded for very long.

Ultimately, I wonder if it is actually not a sustainable business on its own, but that to make it as an online author, you need a paymaster from the MSM. Either that or start asking for donations like they have over at Political Betting.

Anonymous said...

Anon 6.59 said,

"I suspect that wrinkled weasel's definition of a Stalinist is anyone who dares to disagree with his world-view."

First, you probably don't understand my world view, or have an interest in it. Second, you will find that right of centre blogs are much more open to argument, debate and criticism than left-leaning ones.

Your rather absurd claim illustrates the point. The trend, in anonymongs such as yourself, is to shout down, run, hide, and reappear without maintaining a credible position. Not very big and not very clever.

You can disagree as much as you like with me, but instead you will resort to the usual "phobia" mantras as soon as I begin to assemble a case for my views. In other words you have no arguments, only taunts and glib epithets. Your reaction to my post (if the burbled bombast of a vaccous muscle can be called a reaction)sums you up: you are the lumpen mob, full of sound and fury..so...

Do go away and expire.

Anonymous said...

Congratulations to both you and Guido.
Not that keen on the BNP myself but clicked your link only for my browser ( IE ) to crash; it did this several times and also when I typed the URL directly

www.bnp.org.uk

Has someone done their site like a kipper ? Not too keen on that either.

Reactionary Snob said...

Perhaps most worrying is that BNP's website got 37,000 hits. More than the governing party's website and only 3,000 less than the Tories.

Maybe they were all looking for BNP Paribas?

RS

Chris Paul said...

Guido's stats are a complete load of old GuF Iain. What a distortion for example to put up a Guardian area tagged as Politics as a comparator when News, Comment, CiF, Diary etc are all clearly part of the comparable mix. Why would you repeat this nonsense as if it were reasonable. Obviously GuF is a different kettle of fish.

On the BNP question ... the main parties and our MPs and local units etc etc all or mostly have their own websites and blogs ... the BNP have very few of these subsidiary sites. Not quite so worrying on those terms.

Anonymous said...

are you sure thats not the point? If you become too commercial (and I unnnerstan the imperitive to make a living) you will lose your errm charm? You seem to be well aware of PR and developing your "brand". Just keep this blog the way it is or else you'll be asking your PR advisers etc in a few years time "so how can we reach the little people on the web?" well you already do.

Anonymous said...

Chris Paul said...

"On the BNP question ... the main parties and our MPs and local units etc etc all or mostly have their own websites and blogs ... the BNP have very few of these subsidiary sites. Not quite so worrying on those terms."

Dream on, truth-denier.

The bnp site is popular because it reports all the news the lying pc prats don't want people to know. And because the bnp doesn't hate English people, unlike the liblabcons.