In deciding to start blogging, I have been following some bloggers - some people I know, and some I don’t.
I live in the Manchester area, so that’s the focus for my feeds.
NW Insider editor Michael Taylor’s The Marple Leaf is a key one for me, almost always interesting. Mancubist is always stimulating, even if I don’t understand what’s being said half the time; it get contributions from clever chappie Steve Connor of Creative Concern, so it must be good.
Other good Manc blogs to be recommended must include the Manchester Evening News’ digital arm, Manchesteronline, and its multifarious blogs including those by politics reporter David Ottewell and digital diva Sarah Hartley (and colleagues’) The Mancunian Way.
It’s interesting to me that Ottewell now occupies the space of a real city politics insider, almost in the way that the original City Life did way back in 1983-89 - then again, David’s stuff is measured and does not have the wild edge that we had, which looking back, did no one any favours (hey, we were young).
Me being one-eighth Scouse (a grandparent from Liverpool), and with lots of work there, I’d like to see what the papers’ editors are saying, because two dailies targeted at different readership makes for never a dull moment.
Committed reporters on the Post and Echo compete with those on the rival title sitting next to them in the newsroom for the exclusives of the day, which must make for a curious office dynamic.
But as far as I can see both the Echo’s Alistair Machray and Mark Thomas on the Post haven’t blogged in a while. The last thing a busy editor has time to do, I imagine, especially when they’ve been re-configuring their editorial for converged online and print content.
In fact, they have just retitled their editorial staff roles at the Post, I understand, and the features editor is now Head of Content (Advanced). It’s a brave new world alright. I wonder if they still have a real (not virtual) spike, even if it’s just to remind themselves of the old days before the paper-less office.
Along with Manchesteronline, the Liverpool papers’ joint online product www.icliverpool.com has led the way nationally with its converged content, and is a must-see not only for locals but for the Scouse diaspora.
Nationally, one important voice on civil liberties is Henry Porter of The Observer; a must-read for paranoiacs or if you’re not paranoid, up to date detail on how our freedoms are being steadily deleted. And I really appreciate the excellent digest of the best of the blogs by The Times’ Daniel Finklestein.
The really likeable Todd Defren on PR Squared asks loads of honest questions about where all this online stuff is headed. And you’ve got to admire the energy and analysis of the Staniforth PR guys including MD Rob Brown, grappling with what all this social media means for PR.
Paul Fabretti is the rising star of the Manchester/NW online marketing with his blog, while he and Simon Wharton and colleagues at Push On are undoubted thought leaders of the North West social media community - but with all that Twittering when do they have time to do any work? Oh, right, it IS work….
Manchester Confidential is an uneven but rollicking read, not really a ‘blog’ but a successful hybrid of blogs, forums, news service and offers.
But probably the first blogger I followed was the unique Aidan O’Rourke and his proto photo blog - wonderful pics and comment.
Getting round the city, meeting people, making observations - kind of what I used to do for Manchester Evening News and before that City Life.
So big respect to Aidan for being the earliest adopter I know.
Welcome to the “Blogosphere” - yeuch, what a term that is.
City Life: Yes, we were young. And wild. And continually over-worked and under-paid. But we were useful too.
It’s surely not healthy having so much local and regional media clout in the hands of the few? Even the “community” TV station run by a major corporate? And quite a paradox that our title should have been sold to GMG given the alt. vision.
Though I must say that I feel Confidential is nearer to the City Life space than Dave at MEN-blog.
Keep coming across re-treads of the title. Worldwide and closer to home too. Belfast City Airport’s new air-side glossy is called City Life!
Blogging: I’m still doing “wild” in my political blogging … though I think I may be dividing this so that cultural trivia, reviews, previews and general observations can be found in a different place to the cut and thrust of the irreverent poli-blog.
My first “kinda blog” was in 1998 where I did one, consisting only of links and short tag lines, with 36 posts in 36 hours as part of a project with Tosh Ryan at al - 36 Hours in a Mystery Chair (36MC) - the title a hat tip to John Cooper Clarke’s celebration of incarceration in Strangeways.
From then to 2005 I found myself using press letters and literally 100s of electronic communities as my outlet but blogged the 2005 general election as part of John Harris’s SNWDWVF (So Now Who Do We Vote For?), found myself making more and more comments on other people’s blogs, and finally got to be a serious regular blogger about two years ago.
No doubt we’re not far away from Bloggers’ Anonymous …
Welcome!
Chris Paul
PS I would take some time and stick some links in. Perhaps when you’re snagging the site you could add a line or two below saying what html is allowed?
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Must be my vaguely regional accent!
ManchesterOnline.co.uk is no more than a shop window for the MEN/CityLife redesigns these days - though both newish sites are decent and improving.
Thanks for the link… and good luck with this blogging malarkey! Fresh, relevant, interesting content is key.
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Andy,
What can I say? I’m a measured person. Thanks, anyway.
Oh, and Chris - my blog is, and always will be, an add-on to my work for the paper/website. Breaking stories, holding people to account, etc. etc., to professional standards of fairness and accuracy and with no agenda. Some of us think that’s still quite important…
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