Many bloggers’ most frequent contribution to political debate is running commentary on other blogs – who cares?

By Alex Smith

They say never work with children or animals. Children and animals, they say, are intolerable colleagues: rambunctious, precocious, noisy, uncontrollable and fond of wreaking irreparable havoc on your life.

And yet, here I am, Deputy Editor of LabourList, an organisation that’s six weeks old and trying to find a voice in the natural playground of the mischievous impish upstart – the blogosphere.

In these first six weeks, we’ve come a long way in building what I think is becoming a respectable collegiate community of honest free-thinkers online. That doesn’t mean we have consensus – far from it – but we do have debate.

There are a number of reasons for this: we launched early so we could open up to your ideas for our site’s design; we listened when you said comments should be moderated with a lighter touch; we agreed when you suggested that posters needed to respond to comments more; and – surely most impressively – we’re yet to refuse to publish the work of any individual.

All this has meant that in those first six weeks, we’ve published nearly 400 articles by 160 independent writers, attracting nearly 10,000 reader comments in the process. These posts have ranged from direct criticism of government personnel, to heated debate on the future of our movement, to praise for Labour when the government has acted soundly.

But we have, of course, had our difficulties along the way – not least the constant nuisance of rival bloggers who would manipulate or exploit our openness to their own ends; whose most frequent contribution to the political debate is to give a running commentary on what’s happening on other blogs; whose own platforms speak more to the politics of the personality cult than the politics of attainment or constant progress.

That’s why I was disappointed by Iain Dale’s post today and the confusion behind Shamik Das’ piece about Jacqui Smith. Too eager to assert the line that LabourList is in the pockets of the Cabinet, too quick to accuse Derek of censoring criticism, Iain’s post was an example of where blogging is a distraction from, rather than a sincere contribution to the debate.

It’s a problem that is widespread in our online political discourse because, for many, blogging is less a platform for debate than a lifestyle choice. Too many people in the blogging community have become too involved in their own work to see the wood of real, issues-based debate for the trees of personality-based triviality.

I know, because my sister regularly picks up my calls with: “I don’t want to hear about blogging. Talk to me about issues that affect people’s lives and I’ll consider listening”.

I don’t have a problem with Iain Dale specifically. Sure, his Top 10 lists are a little High Fidelity for me, but in truth I don’t know the man. My best mate, who does, assures me “he’s a nice guy, an intelligent guy who you’d disagree with on nearly everything but get along with regardless.”

But I do want to let Iain Dale know that he was wrong on this occasion. Because in this instance, the fact of the matter is simple: our email server had been down for a few days and we simply hadn’t received Shamik’s post when he accused us of censoring it. Even if we had seen it, is it unreasonable that a post we receive at 4.05pm on a Monday has not yet appeared by 7am on the Tuesday?

A number of other untried LabourList voices, who will appear on the site in the next couple of days, will attest to this truth – including Tom Ogg and Johnny Innes, whose posts were among the 59 emails I received retrospectively once our system rediscovered its health this afternoon.

Of course, we will always have hitches and LabourList has a long way to go before it reaches anything like its full potential as a driver for debate. One of our strengths as a group blog is that our posts largely argue opposing points of view – but how do we develop an editorial narrative while continuing to publish diffuse thinking? And how can we stretch our resources to sub-editing for unruly grammar, without denying posters the full freedom of opinion they come here to express?

All these matters will find their answers in the due course of time and consideration – something I’m certain Iain Dale himself will be more diligent with in the future.