A post that’s well-informed is fine, but it’s helpful to provide links to sources, so that the blog reader can check them out and make his/her own judgements. It’s what distinguishes a good blogpost from a good essay, the inherent acknowledgement that the blogger isn’t operating in a vacuum.

The other thing I’d look for? Good comments. I wouldn’t necessarily want to read another blog whose commentary consists of flamefests and regurgitated press releases, regardless of the blogger’s belief in freedom of speech.

These critics, mostly but not all in the traditional media, point to the lack of credibility of many bloggers, their lack of journalism training or adherence to basic principles of journalism, their snatch-and-grab of snippets from traditional media sites (aka real journalism) to offset their lack of original content, and their deliberate skewing of the information they present to push a particular agenda. I’ve heard it compared to a back alley full of cats in heat with a lot of hissing, spitting and loud noise but little else.

There’s more than a bit of hypocrisy in there. The MSM, some would say, is guilty of a lot of the same criticism. How much original reporting does any media outlet in any medium really do? Or do they snatch-and-grab a lot of pre-packaged PR fluff, wire service copy, and unattributed gossip (either political or entertainment) to fill its pages? Anyone who slams the Toronto Star or the National Post might understand.

Look at the number of MSM outlets that have setup personal and corporate blogs to tap into this wish by ordinary folks to have a say in whatever issue (even if they have nothing new or interesting to add). In some cases, such as the Globe and Mail’s comments sections after stories, some people have told me there’s little difference between the reader’s comments there and what they read (and are disgusted by) on a lot of private blogs. So even newspapers have trolls.

But few newspapers, the printed versions at least, have descended into platforms openly advocating racism, bigotry, misogyny, intolerance and other social evils in the name of generating readership or revenues. I wrote “few newspapers” — not all newspapers. I think — I hope — this is the big difference between so-called journalism and blogging.

I believe that the big difference, and disagree if you like, is that one is a social institution built over centuries in the hope that the exchange of rational, reasoned ideas in a public forum is good for political development. The other is not.

Not every letter to the editor should be published for all kinds of reasons, not least because the letter writer may be a paranoid idiot whose letter doesn’t make sense. There aren’t any rules or gatekeepers for bloggers – except for the bloggers themselves.

Some bloggers for instance, staunch defenders of their right to say even the most offensive crap anywhere they want without restriction, refuse to allow anyone else to comment on their own private sites. Others provide open platforms and try to engage readers and hopefully as many participants as possible with good writing and challenging ideas, with peer pressure as perhaps the only moderating factor. When applied to blogging, it’s the old adage that even pigs don’t shit where they eat.

So what makes a good political blog? I think that when the medium achieves some maturity it will be because those who present good ideas, expressed well, with civility and a measure of respect for the views of others, outshine and outdraw the crap that others profess as their right. It ain’t a right – it’s a privilege. I am not required, don’t need or want to read you if I find you don’t engage me or respect me.

Then again, there’s an amazing amount of crap that sells.

Good thread. I rarely comment anywhere because of the above.

Technical competence.

Technical competence just adds that extra something to a blog. When a blogger knows how to manipulate HTML to add a link within the text, instead of just quoting it, that adds to the conciseness of the blog. It adds a touch of credibility to the blogger.

if i recall correctly, they instruct you to replace a portion of the comments script of your template. i believe i simply included their scrpit with the original, then put blogger’s comments option into moderation, thus allowing the earlier comments to remain (viewable via post links/time stamps).

something like that. it’s all a blur, and i’m too lazy to go into my template and suss it out.

KEvron

We don’t hate Muslims, we hate Islam.

I don’t disagree with the value of comments. I think how you approach being great depends to some extent on what being great means to the authors and the visitors.

Some ( not me nor most of the people who visit here ) might consider the style of lgf as great or the style of SDA as great ( style meaning uncritical self-affirming monocultures ). The tactics of being successful with that goal are different than the tactics of the goals generally described in the comments above.

It’s a little off topic but I think communities only scale up to a certain size too.

Here’s more:

I don’t think a good political blog is a partisan blog that’s all about attacking the media coverage (or other bloggers’) of the party that the blogger(s) supports. While media criticism is essential, it should be more than gotcha gotcha journalism.

That said, Canadian media today are so concentrated and so reticent to criticize the party in power (whatever that party may be) for reasons that have to to with broadcast regulation that NONE should be trusted. That means those people obsessed with attacking CBC -TV — ostensibly because a portion of its funding comes from the treasury — are about ideology, not media criticism. If there were halfway serious, they would recognize that Rogers, Shaw, CanWest and CTVglobemedia benefit enormously from the Canadian Television Fund, which is paid for by Heritage and an essentially illegal tax on Canadian cable subscribers.

Blogger wars are stupid. In the real world, nobody gives a shit if SDA’s winged monkeys hate WK’s fans. Get out of the schoolyard, boys and (some) girls.

As for comments …

When comments descend to trolling and attacking other commenters, then it’s time to close them. They are just a waste of time and bandwidth.

Similarly, Jason Cherniak is as good a writer as he is, and he is quite deep within the Liberal party apparatus to give us an interesting window on affairs. However, he is more partisan in his writing, such that I go to his site to see the Liberal point of view, whereas I go to Grit’s site to get a broader analysis.

Excellent point. There are hundreds of people with whom I disagree with, sometimes profoundly, but nonetheless respect because I know they are presenting arguments in good faith. On that issue, correcting and updating posts and acknowledging commenters who’ve been helpful in that respect, goes a long way in establishing credibility.

Red, I’ve passed your query on to the guys in the Engine Room.

p.s. Unrelated, but isn’t there some way to get your comments to “remember” people?

Looking through Balb’s summary I’m not sure that I can add any more attributes to the list. I’ll make a distinction though. I see many of the comments falling into two categories: (1) what makes a good blog and (2) what makes a good community.

A good blog can support a good community but it doesn’t have to: it can stand alone. A good community is almost always supported by good content but furthers it in the discussion.

For example, I read blogs by Wells, and Coyne and Sullivan and others because they have insightful things to say, they have an original voice, I trust them, they avoid being blindly partisan and offer reasoned and reasonable opinions. They don’t have great ( or sometimes any ) communities. I think they are great based on their content.

Great communities rely blog author(s) but they also rely on key members of the community.

The author(s) set the tone and encourage participation in two key ways: they set an example of a willingness to honestly consider alternate views and they participate directly in the discussion or at least make you feel like they are there or nearby and care what happens in the comments. If you do this long enough you will attract people who are willing to do the same.

To sustain a good community you need a handful of regular comment contributors who are like the author(s) and who help police the comments both by example and by discouraging bad behavior ( eg: flames )

I think there are a few attributes which create echo chambers which then attract trolls and flames. One is over-the-topness of content. If you take a position to an extreme then you will induce extreme reactions from ideological opposites. The other is attacking the argument and not attacking the person making the argument. This happens in obvious and more subtle ways. You can say “that person is an idiot …” or you can also say ( for example ) “Bush supporters are brownshirts”.

On the other hand, you don’t want milk-toast every day.

One thing that BBG did, and I consider BBG a late great community, was to pose questions in the posts and not just conclusions — much like you have done here and look at the excellent comments you’ve solicited. “Are Bush supporters really Brown Shirts?” sets off a different discussion than “Bush supporters are brownshirts”.

What makes a good political blog?

- Insightful posts, backed by research and analysis;
- Original opinions and a unique perspective, facts and insights, and not just repetition of party lines or old argument;
- Good writing, and a recognizable voice and style;
- Emphasis on intelligent argument – facts, reason, accurate research;
- Dynamic commentary by a range of readers with different views (with some dissenting on the necessity of comments);
- A literate and articulate readership;
- Avoidance of the common rhetorical fallacies; ad hominem arguments, straw men, and simple partisan cheerleading;
- Participation by the original writer to stimulate and focus discussion, and to defend the original thesis;
-Meaningful topics provocative enought to stimulate a lively discussion;
- Humour;
- A sense of the person behind the blog;
- Frequent new content;
- Concise articles;
- An attractive, reader-friendly design, occasionally updated
- Writers and commenters who are actually exploring issues, not just making arguments, and possibly even willing to change their minds;
- A dynamic that discourages flamefests;
- A focus on the citizen’s perspective, not the politicians’;
- Occasional forays away from the strictly political into culture, music, art, theatre and so

Wonderful stuff, folks. Don’t stop, but I thought I would summarize what you’ve said so far. What else?

I’ll add a personal bugbear of mine. I have to TRUST the writer. If I discover they’ve lied, or knowingly omitted key facts to strengthen an argument, they’ve lost me.