PB2.0 - Where Do We Go from Here?

however, I'm talking true diversity, not tokenism. True diversity means respect for the priorities of others.

(Its not about asking the opinions of "minorities" on the topics that interest you, or finding "minorities" that agree with you on topics. That is tokenism.)

Ultimately, its the responsibility of the blogowner/frontpagers to achieve diversity, and the blogowner/frontpagers have to actively seek out "minority" opinions, link to them, and ask permission to cross-post the work of "minority" bloggers.

(What Open Left did in their attempt at diversity was the precise opposite of achieving true diversity. The polled their readership about what topics they wanted opinions on, then polled their readership to find out whose opinion on the given topic they wanted to read. The result of all that effort was moarly ro add "minority" voices to their echo chamber...)

1. As far as stars: I have no wish to be a star. OTOH, if you make a chart with axes for work and quality, some are farther along the axes than others. And since we're creating content here (more below) it's very hard to separate the quality of the content from individual style. I think the key here is your distinction between "blogging professionals" and "professional bloggers", though (full disclosure here), my increasingly desperate personal situation may make being an amateur untenable for me.

And that said:

2. What's in it for the blogs? I would say, "hits and revenues." My picture, yet to be put to the test, is that there are a LOT of good blogs out there, with fine writing and interesting perspectives, that aren't getting enough of either. Sure, Corrente is a small fish by the side of the A listers, but it's a very large fish in the blogosphere as a whole. So one answer to flattening the curve and keeping the network as a whole healthy, might be a revenue sharing arrangement ("a progressive tax") between the bigger blogs and the smaller ones. (Maybe somebody with a business head, like Ohio, could think this through.

3. I think that there are blogs that won't support the effort exactly because of "What we for PB2.0," and will use the "disgruntled Hillary supporter" perception as a club. First, anyone who buys that, we don't want, and second, I'm betting the blogosphere as a whole is big enough to avoid that nonsense. (Also, once Obama is finally, officially selected, I'd expect the horserace stuff to die down -- though we'd have to find something else for the hits...)

4. As far as price of entry, it did occur to me that an entry fee might bootstrap the micro projects. Not sure about that, though. I think we'd need one under our belt to make a credible claim.

5. I also think we can create and market online books a la lulu.

6. We need to get in touch with the ground. Bruce Dixon I think says that and he's right. I think that PB 2.0 needs to encourage that. Drinking Liberally does that, but ... It's drinking. This sort of thing would provide narrative which would provide support which would provoke further action on the ground providing narrative... This is hard to do, though.

Lots of great stuff in that summary. I can't see anything left out, which might mean that I'm missing something really obvious.

NOTE Again, as far as stigma: It's the age of the anti-Cassandra. There are certain classes and individuals who will never support someone who was right. As in Iraq and the DFHs, so with many other issues today. But people like that are ruled out a priori by the principles. We just have to stick to those and trust in a good outcome.

[ ] Very tepidly voting for Obama [ ] ?????. [ ] Any mullah-sucking billionaire-teabagging torture-loving pus-encrusted spawn of Cthulhu, bless his (R) heart.

As far as how one creates a blogosphere 2.0, you can't create it. The closest thing that you can do is state certain principles, promulgate those principles, make a special effort to read/link to those that subscribe to those principles, and create PB 2.0 specific blogrolls.

Social Business versus Corporate Social Responsibility: SB means "for-profit / no dividends" (investors only get back what they put in, the Kiva model), CSR means "for-profit / dividends" with some regard for the activities of the business to get some undefined socially responsible goal or behave in some undefined socially responsible manner.

I think you missed the Creative Corp model, which offers clearly defined socially responsible positions built into its charter. For example, instead of the board having only a fiduciary duty to the stockholders, the board can be charged of getting rid of any profits. Basically, set a goal of zero for profits and dividends---all money must be used by the end of the fiscal year.

This does not mean no growth equals you can't include more people. But the growth is about participation and trying to make the whole effort self-sustaining.

Paul brings up a point about diversity of voices. I don't think that can be legislated, but it can be promoted, marketed, and paid for. If individuals can get some revenue from their efforts, so much the better. No one will make a living, but people should be paid for their work. Not everyone has the advantage of being able to sustain this effort without getting paid for it.

And if people don't want the income, they can choose not to be paid. In fact, they could choose to have any and all income sent back to Corrente, to a 527, another cause, etc. (FTR, there will be tax ramifications for individuals, but 1099s aren't that hard to do. But if someone doesn't want to collect, then no tax ramifications for them.)

lambert, do you have a hamster care and feeding bill? Even more, what's the donation rate? Have you any numbers regarding a fund-drive or anything? A sense of the challenges here (what are the running deficits of Corrente?) will, IMO, suggest a business structure to enable PB2.0 to start paying its own way.

An entry fee or subscription...could you expand on this?

(It's not that I'm not interested in the larger principles---I am. But paying people for their work is important to me and a free exchange of ideas can't be free if it can't stand on its own two feet. So to speak.)

I don't really like the idea of controlling entry into PB2.0. That will inevitably, IMO, lead to corruption.

What is the problem now? For me its finding and keeping track of blogs that interest me. What I would like is to find out about new blogs and be able to track ones I like. There are lots of blogs out there that are in no man's land because of publicity shortfalls. Essentially, the only place for casual blogreaders are the high traffick sites because of their notariety.

My ideal would be something like a Netflix model. A way to search for blogs and be able to rate ones you like and don't like. This would only available to me--no public info--so that we don't end up with troll ratings. This gives the individual the power to chose what they want to read. I think this can benefit the less well known blogs and means the lil' guy/gal doesn't have to rely on links from well known blogs since they can directly compete with the bigger blogs, if done correctly (widget, search, personalized tracking/ rating).

Would we have to let in blog abusers? Probably, but the decentralized power from personalized ratings means if you find a site that you find abusive, you can stop going there and find another blog, which is what I have always done, but its always limited to blogs I accidentally stumble upon, e.g. Corrente.

I think my desired version would help me stumble on more blogs easier and more frequently. That's ONE of the things I'd like.

i've thought a bit about the connectedness and the monetarization of blogging since participating in blogroll amnesty day...

1. i don't like the idea of needing to spend any more money as a prerequsite for participation in important discussions [we're already buying computers and paying for internet access to do this] but i do like the idea of selling stuff that's related [or not] to the blog content [seems to work for obama] to support a discussion space [the coffee mug, the lolspeak magnets, do want].

2. once you start selling your content [as opposed to stuff] you run into issues of using other peoples' content. right now, i have no qualms quoting freely, and sometimes extensively, from other [mostly bigger and/or commercial] sites/blogs. i don't participate in google's adwhateveritis, and i'm just a tiny little pipsqueak anyway, so along the lines of molly ivins rules about satire, i feel justified.