My introduction at Netroots UK today
Today, Netroots UK brings together a new generation of left activists, working and discussing politics online, with the veteran institutions of trade unions and many others.
Our plan isn’t to have long-winded discussions, but create useful spaces where people can discuss strategy drawing on their experience of local campaigns: what works and what doesn’t.
Some people have asked whether this is an event just to celebrate how great blogging, Twitter, Facebook or social media generally are. That would be absurd.
continue reading… »
A year of campaigns and statistics – How 2010 shaped up for us
Anyone remember Rod Liddle? Just over a year ago, during the Christmas holidays, I was out in the sticks and saw on my twitter that Rod Liddle was in the running to be editor of the Independent.
And so started our first campaign of 2010 – one that was ultimately successful in no small part with help from Facebook, from fellow bloggers and from email-campaign gurus 38 Degrees.
Rod Liddle even threatened legal action, but like most of his work – it came to nothing. Ah well.
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LC Blog Nation: the aftermath
Thank you to all who came to the LC Blog Nation event. It was a lovely, sunny day and you should be commended for willing to give up your Saturday for that. We had a packed theatre hall, and I would post some pictures but I seem to have left my camera in the hall (did anyone find it?).
We also had live coverage on Twitter.
It was the first in what I hope will become an annual fixture in the political calendar. My aim was two-fold: (a) two create a space for many bloggers, activists and campaigners to meet each other and share ideas and plans; (b) discuss strategy on how the left could move forward.
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Women – hear me roar
Right. Frothing a bit here, people.
Liberal Conspiracy – a site I generally love with a passion – has managed to find yet another educated, well-off woman to write a ‘women are victims and sad fannies’ piece.
I can’t tell you how furious this stupendously male vision of the female state makes me.
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LC Blog Nation conference: a draft programme
Thanks to all those who contributed and emailed in with your thoughts and suggestions for the draft programme for LC Blog Nation on 26th June.
If you want to attend you can email me or .
Here is a draft programme. This is obviously subject to change, and I’d like your input below.
continue reading… »
Blog Nation: what would you like to see discussed?
On 26th June LC will be hosting Blog Nation (my unimaginative name for our annual conference). Thanks to all of those who have already emailed in with requests: we are now two-thirds full.
The first Blog Nation event in July 2008 was nice, but ultimately just a panel discussion event. I want to try something different and would like your involvement.
Aims of the event
1. Meet other bloggers, journalists, think-tankers, activist, organisers
2. To have time and space to discuss issues
3. Have a sense of strategic direction on particular issues; find out what projects are taking place.
4. Share books
5. Discuss and learn about activism already taking place.
Unlike other conferences, and they have their own place, I want this to be strategy focused. In other words rather than debate issues, we have competing or interesting perspectives on how to move forward, what is currently taking place and how people can get involved.
The theme of the event is: ‘How Does the Left Organise in Opposition?‘
A few questions to think about:
- Do we focus on broader narratives or stick to specific topics? Or if a mixture of the two, what would you like to see discussed?
- Given the layout of the venue, what do you think the format should be?
- What mini-sessions would you like to see?
Layout of venue
The circles are tables. I thought it would be better than having lines of podium facing chairs. This way you can talk, meet and discuss with others more easily during discussion sessions. The two breakout rooms are also available if we need them.
Broad themes
Party political vs non-aligned organising – which should we focus on? Or how do we do both?
Is Labour part of the problem or part of the solution?
How can the left work toegther, better?
What approach to take towards Libdems?
Communitarianism vs internationalism: which way do we want to go?
Should we be drawing up a list of ‘progressive politicians’ to support on an ongoing basis?
Issues
Responding to budget cuts
Abortion and sex education
Climate change
Immigration
Electoral reform
The West Lothian Question
Where now for foreign policy?
Taxation and tax havens
London Mayoral election – what can be done?
There will also be mini-sessions:
Political Scrapbook is planning a short presentation on how some of us left-bloggers are planning to set up a cooperative of sorts to collaborate on various things. You’ll hear more about that then.
If you would like to attend, you have to drop me an email at blognation[-at-]liberalconspiracy[-dot-]org. It is free to attend but invite only.
Now I’m opening this out to all of you for your thoughts and ideas.
LC attracted 130,000 unique visitors in May as left-wing blogs grow more broadly
I don’t make a habit of publishing our reader figures every month but I have to make an exception this time. I’m pleased to say May was the first time Liberal Conspiracy broke the 100,000 unique visitors a month mark.
The actual figure was 129,927 Absolute Unique Visitors for entire month, recording just over half a million page views (502,957). Both figures are measured by Google Analytics.
continue reading… »
Liberal Conspiracy Annual Conference: 26th June
On 26th June I’m hosting the second Liberal Conspiracy ‘Blog Nation’ conference.
We hosted the first one in July 2008; I’m hoping to make it an annual event thereafter.
The theme of the conference will be: “How Can The Left Organise in Opposition?”
continue reading… »
A message for Nick Clegg…
The sun was shining on the sea,
Shining with all his might:
He did his very best to make
The billows smooth and bright–
And this was odd, because it was
The middle of the night.
The moon was shining sulkily,
Because she thought the sun
Had got no business to be there
After the day was done–
“It’s very rude of him,” she said,
“To come and spoil the fun!”
The sea was wet as wet could be,
The sands were dry as dry.
You could not see a cloud, because
No cloud was in the sky:
No birds were flying overhead–
There were no birds to fly.
The Walrus and the Carpenter
Were walking close at hand;
They wept like anything to see
Such quantities of sand:
“If this were only cleared away,”
They said, “it would be grand!”
“If seven maids with seven mops
Swept it for half a year.
Do you suppose,” the Walrus said,
“That they could get it clear?”
“I doubt it,” said the Carpenter,
And shed a bitter tear.
“O Oysters, come and walk with us!”
The Walrus did beseech.
“A pleasant walk, a pleasant talk,
Along the briny beach:
We cannot do with more than four,
To give a hand to each.”
The eldest Oyster looked at him,
But never a word he said:
The eldest Oyster winked his eye,
And shook his heavy head–
Meaning to say he did not choose
To leave the oyster-bed.
But four young Oysters hurried up,
All eager for the treat:
Their coats were brushed, their faces washed,
Their shoes were clean and neat–
And this was odd, because, you know,
They hadn’t any feet.
Four other Oysters followed them,
And yet another four;
And thick and fast they came at last,
And more, and more, and more–
All hopping through the frothy waves,
And scrambling to the shore.
The Walrus and the Carpenter
Walked on a mile or so,
And then they rested on a rock
Conveniently low:
And all the little Oysters stood
And waited in a row.
“The time has come,” the Walrus said,
“To talk of many things:
Of shoes–and ships–and sealing-wax–
Of cabbages–and kings–
And why the sea is boiling hot–
And whether pigs have wings.”
“But wait a bit,” the Oysters cried,
“Before we have our chat;
For some of us are out of breath,
And all of us are fat!”
“No hurry!” said the Carpenter.
They thanked him much for that.
“A loaf of bread,” the Walrus said,
“Is what we chiefly need:
Pepper and vinegar besides
Are very good indeed–
Now if you’re ready, Oysters dear,
We can begin to feed.”
“But not on us!” the Oysters cried,
Turning a little blue.
“After such kindness, that would be
A dismal thing to do!”
“The night is fine,” the Walrus said.
“Do you admire the view?
“It was so kind of you to come!
And you are very nice!”
The Carpenter said nothing but
“Cut us another slice:
I wish you were not quite so deaf–
I’ve had to ask you twice!”
“It seems a shame,” the Walrus said,
“To play them such a trick,
After we’ve brought them out so far,
And made them trot so quick!”
The Carpenter said nothing but
“The butter’s spread too thick!”
“I weep for you,” the Walrus said:
“I deeply sympathize.”
With sobs and tears he sorted out
Those of the largest size,
Holding his pocket-handkerchief
Before his streaming eyes.
“O Oysters,” said the Carpenter,
“You’ve had a pleasant run!
Shall we be trotting home again?’
But answer came there none–
And this was scarcely odd, because
They’d eaten every one.
LC Mission Series Part 4: Welcome to the new Conspiracy
I’ve been doing a lot of thinking about the future of Liberal Conspiracy while Sunny has been away. Before I hand back the editorial reins and he resumes editing the site, I’d like to set out my contribution to our mission series, and the changes which you can expect to see over the next month.
As Sunny explained, our aim is to become less of a blog and more of a platform. We want to offer news to lefties on what’s going on in the political world; offer thoughts on how they can get involved; and provide space for them to launch and sustain their own campaigns. The changes that you will see to the site reflect these aims.
1. New contributors
continue reading… »
Our Kingdom: Towards a new on-line politics
This is a contribution to the Liberal Conspiracy Mission Series
Sunny wants to build Liberal Conspiracy with more political strategy, activism and news. But it is not just content that he is after. What Sunny is attempting is ambitious, important for British blogland and on-line publishing and for OurKingdom, as we prepare a relaunch. He’s written three posts. I commented briefly on the first.
Liberal Conspiracy is immensely creative and refreshing. As well as tackling issues and being smart and forthright, it goes about things in a different way from your average lefty or liberal blog. It looks outwards to what is happening not inwards to what ‘line’ it should be taking. With this new development Sunny is trying to get us all to think with a similarly fresh spirit about our methods and how we resource them in the coming era of citizen journalism. continue reading… »
The contradiction inherent to right-wing blogs
Sunny has been running a series of posts on where he wants to take Liberal Conspiracy [part 1, part 2 and part 3]. What has piqued my interest is the response this sort of action draws from the rightwing blogosphere.
Mr Eugenides commented very even handedly on Sunny’s last piece and I think it is worth responding.
He says: (this is an extract):
Tory blogs have tried to emulate the campaigning style of online leftwing campaigns – #Kerryout, for example – and by and large we don’t do it very well. I myself have taken part in some campaigns – for the Gurkhas, Iraqi interpreters, free speech online – and it’s noticeable that many of them have been organised and pushed from the left – I have sometimes been, if not the token Tory, then at least one of a relative few.
I’m sure there’s a thesis to be written on this somewhere down the line, but I think the bottom line is this; that while a small part of me wishes you luck (and another, much larger part, hopes that all attempts to “destroy the right” end in ignominious failure), I can’t help thinking that a loosely-focused left-wing blog is going to have difficulty making an impact in our politics because – unlike Conservative Home – LC doesn’t represent a recognisable consituency that politicians need to pander to.
First of all, I think there is a constituency Liberal Conspiracy can tap into, and one which has been abandoned since 1997.
continue reading… »
LC Mission Series: part 3 – Creating a platform
In my sporadic LC Mission Series, I’m trying to lay out some thoughts on what I think the Left’s approach should be to political parties as well as politics in general. As well as have a discussion around the point of political blogging and online activism of course. As always – you are all welcome to chip in with your thoughts.
In the first part I talked about the need for infrastructure. In the second, a need for taking a different approach to politics – more like that of an outside insurgency.
I want to press home the first point again and explain what I mean. Sometimes there’s no point just saying something – you just have to do it and see how it works out.
The point of blogging
I’m sick of opinion blogging. Everyone has an opinion and frankly it all gets very repetitive eventually. Plus, lefties love writing long articles when a short, punchy one-liner will do.
continue reading… »
LC Mission Series: part 2 – An insurgency at the gates
Late last year I was invited to speak by the Oxford University Libdems. This is an edited version of what I said, and seeps into much of my thinking.
In 2003 a political operative in the US by the name of Rob Stein made a series of presentations on how conservatives in the US had, over a period of thirty years, built a “message machine” and spent around $300 million a year to promote its agenda.
According to the New York Times the presentations were made to rich political entrepreneurs with a clear message: stop thinking in terms of politics in terms of elections, and focus more on building an infrastructure to support and build political ideas they liked.
Rob Stein wanted to point out how long term investment to ensure that in 10-20-30 years time, the Democrats would be the dominant political force instead of the Republicans.
I’m making this point here, today, in front of this audience, because you may be the future of the Liberal Democrats. And I think it’s time the liberal-left, of which you may be a part of, embraced the necessity and importance of insurgency politics.
continue reading… »
Political blogs and their influence
I haven’t gotten around to starting my long-planned debate on the future of LibCon and unveil some new parts of the site as I promised. Hopefully later this week.
But I wanted to repeat one or two quick points I made the other night at the debate at Westminster Skeptics event on political blogging.
Put aside the false dichotomy that Nick Cohen set up by saying bloggers don’t do any proper investigations. I gave about 6 examples and had plenty more to offer. Nick Cohen talking on a subject he clearly knows little about shock. The real debate is actually about how differently the more popular blogs view their ‘model’.
Here is how I see it.
continue reading… »
How social media will affect politics: at Progressive London
I’ve been asked to speak at the Progressive London conference this Saturday, on the subject of how blogs and social media will affect the political climate and maybe even the upcoming election.
You may have read a fair bit on the growing prominence of leftwing blogs recently and, where the analysis has come from right-wing bloggers, most of it has been horse-shit. Lefties have been making a lot of noise recently on blogs and Twitter – I won’t deny that. But much has been speculation and back-scratching rather than straightforward strategic planning and thinking.
My talk at Progressive London will be the first attempt to lay out some thoughts on where LibCon could go and how. Next week from Monday I’m going to write some thoughts here on our editorial policy, how the left needs to do things differently and how we could prepare for a Tory government.
New Labour may be in power and the Tories may think lefties control the establishment, but make no mistake: we are on the outskirts. We are not the establishment. We face a tightly organised conservative machine, aided by a growing group of front organisations, that further the Tory agenda. It’s time we became more unashamedly partisan about our agenda.
I don’t know of any other blog that gets so many right-wingers coming on to say what they think should be published or what we shouldn’t write about. This blog isn’t for a “balanced debate” and neither is it for right-whingers. It is here to reflect the broad range of left-wing thinking and to promote others to build a new left-wing movement. More on this on Saturday and next week.
Will the left’s renewal come from the web?
contribution by Ed Wallis
The Fabian Review New Year special is out now, and it previews the major political schisms of a pivotal political year.
Whatever the outcome of this year’s election, the air is going to be thick with renewal. James Crabtree has some interesting advice in the magazine for lefties seeking the next big thing: don’t bother.
“Hoping for a British Obama to turn up is even less likely than wishing for some kind of super-charged Geoff Mulgan-on-steroids to dream up an entirely new vision of social democracy.”
continue reading… »
2009 in statistics and popular blog posts
2009 year was a tremendous year for LibCon – well, our second year since launching in Nov 2007. Our visitor figures doubled and we hosted a tremendous range of debate on the blog, and attracted comment across other blogs.
The most notable trend is perhaps how social media is becoming an increasingly important space where people post links and have debates.
continue reading… »
So, We Can Engineer a Mass Movement to Hack the Christmas Pop Charts, but We Can’t Agree on a Global Climate Change Treaty?
The schadenfreude becomes stale quite quickly, doesn’t it? No sooner had the whoops of glee at Simon Cowell’s failure to reach the Christmas Number 1 spot for the fifth consecutive year, and the many ironies of the Rage Against the Machine campaign were clear for all to see. First amongst these is the fact that R.A.t.M.’s angry Killing in the Name and Joe McElderry’s saccharine version of The Climb were Sony Music records: Joe is on Simco Records (i.e. Simon Cowell) “under exclusive licence to Sony Music Entertainment UK Ltd” while Rage Against The Machine’s label is Epic, a subsidiary of Sony.
The campaign put a small dent into Simon Cowell’s sales figures. Last year, Alexandra Burke’s Hallelujah sold 576,000 copies in the week before Christmas, while this year Joe McElderry only managed 450,000. But this hardly suggests that Cowell’s business model is on the wane – Leon Jackson only sold 275,000 copies of his single, When You Believe in 2007. Cowell knows that a bit of controversy is good for his bottom line. He knows that the label ‘Christmas Number One’ is an entirely relative marketing concept anyway, and modern music history is littered with classic hits which never reached that false summit.
So although the Facebook campaigners for Rage Against the Machine were successful, I can’t help thinking that there is something confused about the campaign and its aims. They say:
… it’s given many others hope that the singles chart really is for everybody in this country of all ages, shapes, and sizes…and maybe re-ignited many people’s passion for the humble old single as well as THAT excitement again in actually tuning in to the chart countdown on a Sunday.
In taking this line, the campaigners seem to be endorsing the Singles Chart as an appropriate indicator of good and popular music, when it is manifestly nothing of the sort. Yes, they reclaimed the ‘excitement’ for a single week… but they did so with a seventeen year-old song which was chosen precisely for its contrast with its competitor. That is entirely different from what the campaigners have nostalgia for – new music from good bands, battling it out. Former chart battles were essentially a positive contest, with music fans buying their favourite record. The 2009 campaign had an entirely negative “anyone by Cowell” message, which is unsustainable.
False Metrics
Modern internet campaigns often seem to fall into the trap of chasing targets based on false metrics. The campaign for Gary McKinnon (the computer hacker in danger of extradition to the US) seems to be a victim:
lets make #mckinnonmonday ‘trend’ – TWEET4GARY NOW !!! please tweet ALL #american friends and ask them to help #FREEGARY #garyMckinnon
- @cliffsul
The aim of #mckinnonmonday is to make Gary McKinnon trend #garymckinnon Pls RT
- @dandelion101
Shouldn’t the aim be to generate anger and interest in the Gary McKinnon story? How helpful is all the constant RT’ing if it doesn’t translate to bodies at the protest, letters in the politician’s in-tray.
And it is not just impoverished grassroots campaigners falling into this trap, either. Here is a recent tweet from a Cabinet Minister:
Support #welovetheNHS, add a #twibbon to your avatar now! – http://twibbon.com/join/welovetheNHS
Admittedly, sending the tweet is hardly a burden on Mr Milband’s resources, but its odd and disturbing that politicians and political campaigns have started to relate to us in this way. The idea that the NHS is something to love is presumed, and the campaign becomes about forming a huge group of people around a slogan for a fleeting moment only. Did anyone capture the e-mail addresses of those who tweeted #welovetheNHS? If not then it seems like a wasted moment.
And as for Twibbons? This innovation seems to me to be a hugely reductive exercise, shrinking political debate to a space 100 pixels wide.
Now, lest you assume I am engaging in pure snark, I should point out that I am as guilty of this hashtag chasing as the next person – perhaps more so. I helped the Burma Campaign devise their 64forSuu.org project, which was, frankly, all about the hashtag. And only today I’ve written a press release lauding the fact that PEN‘s Libel Reform petition has just reached 10,000 signatures, a figure that will something only if it serves to light a fire under either Jack Straw or Dominic Grieve.
Its very easy to raise ‘awareness’ of any given issue, but that’s not the same thing as establishing a consensus that what you are proposing is right. And in turn, that is not the same thing as actually motivating people to action. It would be a great shame if “taking action” became synonymous with simply sharing links and joining endless Facebook groups, because when that “action” fails to translate into meaningful change, we will only find that another generation have been turned off politics, disillusioned. The Obama campaign has been criticised recently for its rather top-down approach to twitter, which didn’t really engage in conversation with supporters. But nevertheless, he actually inspired people out of their houses and into the campaign HQs. Did some of us think that Twitter could start a revolution in Iran? Not quite (as Jay Rosen points out). While the #IranElection tag on Twitter has been a useful tool for the protesters and for those reporting on the crisis it is clearly the people on the ground that will really put that regime under pressure (and we hope that the passing of Ayatollah Hoseyn Ali Montazeri will provide inspiration to renew that pressure).
All of which is to say that George Monbiot’s sanctimonious article this morning had the ring of truth about it:
For the past few years good, liberal, compassionate people – the kind who read the Guardian – have shaken their heads and tutted and wondered why someone doesn’t do something. Yet the number taking action has been pathetic. Demonstrations which should have brought millions on to the streets have struggled to mobilise a few thousand. As a result the political cost of the failure at Copenhagen is zero. Where are you?
We’ve been tweeting #hashtags and adding #twibbons to our avatar, George. Get with the programme, yeah?
This is cross-posted on my own blog. I’ve also just added a counter-point to all this, ‘In praise of 100px Campaigns‘. It would be great to have comments on that side of the debate, too.
Policy Exchange: You win some, you lose some…
Sunny’s busy elsewhere at the moment, so I guess I’d better take on the news that the North London Central Mosque’s libel action against Tory think-tank, Policy Exchange, has been struck out by Justice Eady, leaving the trustees of the mosque facing a £75,000 legal bill just to cover PX’s legal bills.
The case related to allegations made in a 2007 report by Denis McEoin, ‘The Hijacking of British Islam’, which was withdrawn earlier this year, at the same time as it issued this apology to one of the organisations named in the report as allegedly selling extremist literature.
The Hijacking of British Islam:
Al-Manaar Muslim Cultural Heritage CentreIn this report we state that Al-Manaar Muslim Cultural Heritage Centre is one of the Centres where extremist literature was found. Policy Exchange accepts the Centre’s assurances that none of the literature cited in the Report has ever been sold or distributed at the Centre with the knowledge or consent of the Centre’s trustees or staff, who condemn the extremist and intolerant views set out in such literature. We are happy to set the record straight.
The key phrase in this piece of news seems to be ‘struck out’, which gives no clues whatsoever as to the reason that the mosque’s libel action failed. As yet, there’s nothing on BAILI relating to this case, so whether it failed on a technicality, or because the mosque was unable to put forward a viable case, or even because Justice Eady decided that the mosque has no reputation to defend is anyone’s guess.
I must admit to being a little disappointed that this case failed to all the way to a full hearing, not because I really give a toss about either side winning or losing but because it might have shed just a little bit more light on the circumstances that resulted in McEoin incorporating fabricated evidence in his report. continue reading… »
You can read articles through the front page, via Twitter or RSS feed.
» The limited remorse of Bob Diamond
» It’s not liberals deluded about Islam – it’s conservatives
» Why Labour’s triangulation on welfare is a strategic error
» Why the BBC and Charlie Brooker are wrong over Eastenders
» Suggestions for #NetrootsUK organisers
» Conservatives and the media are being left behind on public opinion
» Why reducing employment rights won’t boost employment
» Why Labour was right to run a deficit before banking crisis
» We have to embrace our differences when opposing cuts
» After Gabrielle Giffords: violence in US culture
» Why are all Pakistani men are being smeared in the sex-grooming cases?
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