This just in from John Bishop
Blogs to be more important politically
Bloggers and blogging are going to play a much more important role in the 2008 election campaign than in previous elections, blogger and political strategist David Farrar told a business audience in Wellington just this lunchtime.
In the 2005 election blogs had almost no effect, as they were still a novelty and marginal in the overall communications process. However that had changed with all the political editors in the Parliamentary Press Gallery now having their own blogs where they could say what they really felt about politicians. Also "there is now a routine transfer of material from blogs to the mainstream media." The line between bloggers and journalists was becoming blurred.
Overseas all the main Presidential candidates in the US had weekly sessions with sympathetic bloggers who helped to spread their messages and take part in on line conversations.
Mr Farrar also referred to a range of public figures who had been forced out of office in part at least because of the efforts of bloggers. "Peter Hain in the UK is only the latest to have to stand down as the result of a campaign that started with a single blogger with time on his hands."
Of the NZ political party websites, Mr Farrar rated the Greens as the best followed by National and ACT with Labour fourth. "There's been no fresh content put up since 12 February," he said noting that Labour relied much more on the Parliamentary site to get information from Ministers out to interested parties. The other parties' sites were poor but he noted that United's leader Peter Dunne was responsive.
