A heartfelt plea to non-bloggers
Dear Non-blogger
It’s possible you saw this exchange between ‘top’ ‘bloggers’ Guido Fawkes and Derek Draper on the telly at lunchtime.
I ask you, I beg you, I beseech you, not to consider these two squealing, mewling propagandists representative of the rich and vibrant and funny and thought-provoking world of blogs, bloggers and blogging. Most bloggers wash and don’t look like we slept in our clothes either.
Me? Needless to say, I’m just jealous of these shrill, greasy thugs’ readership and reach, aren’t I? Here, courtesy of Tim Ireland, is why…
What with Iain Dale being shortlisted for the George ‘What I have most wanted to do… is to make political writing into an art’ Orwell Prize for blogging as well, it’s been a been a very bad day for blogging. But please, please don’t think too badly of all of us just because the so-called leading lights of the blogging medium are such awful and disappointing examples.
Your friend
Justin
Update: Beau does it best…
Posted on March 26th, 2009 at 3:02pm under Blog, bloggers and blogging
I thoroughly agree.
xD.
What a pair of scruffy, fat sods, this is what happens when you sit in front of a PC all day rather than having a real life.
Yeah, I’d say I fear for their Vitamin D levels. Except I don’t.
Who are you supporting for the Orwell Prize, then, out of interest?
It is A. Mortimer for me.
If Alix doesn’t win. Then I’d don’t dare dare.
Anybody but her. Be nice if it went to somebody who could write plainly (which she can’t) and with honesty (ditto). And who wasn’t a party hack (nought out of three).
Where does that leave Dale? He doesn’t score any better.
“There is no establishing the precedency….”
Draper vs Dale, Hitchens vs Cohen and the discovery of a twittering plant. It’s been a bad day on the internets.
That should read ‘Draper vs Staines’. Like I said, it’s been a bad day…
Actually, I thought the twittering plant was quite good. It’s better than the planted twits.
Ho ho ho.
xD.
God it was dire – A Grange Hill playground incident played out on a politics show.
I have remade the end credits and sent a link to The Daily Politics.
You can see them here (but
you’ll probably have to be over a certain age to get the reference.)
Quality!
Excellent work Bo, sums up the sorry state of popularist blogging to a tee.
Equally depressing to see Dale claim that his shortlisting for the Orwell has reduced us to apoplexy when, for me a least, the result is more an air of tired resignation. When a hack like Dale can be shortlisted for an award which states its core value as “What I have most wanted to do throughout the past ten years is to make political writing into an art. ” then you can only assume that the Prize committee places popularity ahead of Orwell’s values of quality.
If Dale wins I’m going to personally call on each member of the Prize committee to either resign or justify the award and then resign. If they consider Dale worthy, then they obviously don’t give a damn about Orwell’s legacy.
[...] unedifying slanging match. Everyone has pointed this out and a few people have pointed out that it did particular damage to political blogging and that we don’t want another Paul [...]
I was considering a return to blogging soon. Now I’m not so sure. That’s not a brush you’d want to be tarred with.
I know what you mean. The UK Today has been languishing for nearly a year since my last post. Every time I think of resurrecting it something like this happens to make me think again.
When someone like Dale can be shortlisted for an award which, supposedly, places value on writing as art, then you have to wonder what future the English language has.
Yes, but finding a blogger who can write good plain English is almost as hard as finding a pop music writer who can do the same.