| Netpolitique : DailyKos.com
is one of the most influential political weblogs in
the world. To give our European readers an idea, how
big of an audience do you have on average?
Markos Moulitsas : Daily Kos gets between 600,000
and 700,000 visits every day, and that number grows
by about about 5-10 percent every *week*. Now that includes
multiple people visiting more than once a day, so it's
hard to say how many individual people that includes.
Nielsen ratings has me at 476,000 unique daily readers,
but I don't quite trust their numbers.
As for geographic breakdowns, that's even harder to
gauge. The vast
majority of my audience is obviously in the United States,
but I do
have significant traffic from the Pacific Rim, Australia,
and Europe.
In fact, there's a spinoff site from Daily Kos run by
community
members based in Europe, called the European Tribune
(www.eurotrib.com).
Netpolitique.net : Beyond day-to-day blogging,
you're also actively involved in online campaigns for
progressive causes and candidates. How do you go about
mobilizing blogs and online communities, as in the case
of the Paul Hackett's campaign for instance? Does it
take a star blogger or can the netroots sprout spontaneously?
Markos Moulitsas : I don't generally lead. All
of the campaigns that have grabbed notice in the past
couple of years were launched by regular people, and
I simply lent my support. I think it's important for
people to realize that this is a new model of activism.
The press and politicians still think it's a traditional
model -- from top to bottom. So they come to me and
think that by "reaching out" to me they can
reach my audience. That's complete crap. It needs to
be the exact opposite, they need to reach out to my
audience. And if my audience decides its an endeavor
worthy of support, *then* I'll get involved.
Much the same way with the press -- they think I'm somehow
leading
all these efforts. So I get credit or blame for things
I had nothing
to do with. They have a hard time understanding that
netroots
activism bubbles up from the bottom. It's unlike anything
in the
history of politics.
And that's why I love it so much. I don't have the pressure
of being
everything to everyone. I don't have to lead every campaign,
or act
as a gatekeeper over what should be supported and what
shouldn't. I
simply wait back and see these campaigns emerge, and
only jump aboard when they have built substantial grassroots
support. And this teaches people to be active, not passive.
It teaches them that they can, in fact, make a difference
if they do the hard work. The old model -- the one were
"leaders" made all such decisions -- taught
people to be passive. Now, we're encouraging people
to take matters into their own hands, rather than wait
for someone else to take the lead.
Netpolitique.net : You indicated that blogs have
the potential to become "message- machines",
as well as "organizing machines". Can you
give us examples? If so, wouldn't this evolution make
political parties irrelevant in the long run?
Markos Moulitsas : I won't predict the future
of political parties, since I have no idea what the
blogs and netroots will look like in a year, much less
five or ten.
But yes, the blogs are best when used as a message machine,
much like the Right has used talk radio and cable television
to dominate the
national conversation in the United States. Rush Limbaugh
alone reaches 30 million Americans every week, which
means he speaks directly to about a third of all Republican
voters. We have nothing
even remotely like that. The left hasn't had that sort
of outlet for
its message ever. Now, we are creating it online.
That's why the blogosphere is so much more important
for the Left
than it is for the Right. For conservatives, their blogs
are merely
an extension of their vast message machine. For liberals,
it's the
only way to get our message out.
Netpolitique.net : Last, but not least: our ritual
question: what are your top 3 bookmarks?
Markos Moulitsas :
I've got four:
MyDD
www.mydd.com
Steve Gilliard
Stevegilliard.blogspot.com
Eschaton
atrios.blogspot.com
AMERICAblog
www.americablog.org
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