D.D. 05/08/05

I had a great time at BlogNashville and learned a lot about what fellow bloggers think about blogging. I had a great lunch yesterday with Ben Cunningham, Bill Hobbs, and Blake Wylie where we discussed the influences of blogging on politics and the future of the Tennessee political blogosphere. I have a feeling there will be some good projects to come. It was also good to meet Joe from Chattanooga Civic Forum and discuss tenatively with him community-based blogging. I know that he has some great ideas for Chattanooga-community based blogging. Of course it's always a pleasure to visit with Michael Silence. I also formally introduced myself to Glenn Reynolds for the first time, even though I'd seen him plenty of times before.



It was an excellent experience and I believe I have a firmer grasp on blogging and the possibilities that blogging can bring to citizen journalism. I still have to say, though, that the session that I took the most from was blogging on local politics, hosted by Ed Cone- although, it was much more centered on community blogging than I had predicted it would be. Obviously, there are campaign blogs, "issue" blogs, and governance blogs and the discussion was more about blog diversity in politics rather than focusing on the impact blogs can have on say political campaigns, which would have been more of my interest. The thesis seemed to be that blogs provide a forum for governance and political issues online that puts citizens in touch with their representatives better and can "intellectualize" the political debate.



I hope to take everything I've learned and make this blog and even better outlet for Tennessee politics and also begin to expand into some other areas that may be interesting to a politically involved audience. Stay tuned and keep visiting.