Chris Trotter started blogging just a couple of months ago, and, predictably, was an overnight sensation.
The winning way with words, the sometimes deeply insightful, sometimes downright provocative, commentary won him legions of fans and enemies and a big slice of the blogging action in our corner of cyberspace. Some of his posts, such as the review of the ill-fated City Vision administartion in Auckland City, were sublime.
Then, after the election, he swore off blogging.
Now he’s back! Here. The new blog is named after the North Otago road that leads to the farm where he spent much of his childhood. (Homepaddock seems to be familiar with the area.) In keeping with the arcadian theme, the blog is intended as “an outlet for his more ruminative and eligaic impulses.” Reflective, in a word.
Welcome back, Chris. I look forward to being variously entertained, challenged, enlightened, inspired and appalled.
Tags: NZ blogs
Jafapete's Weblog 
November 17, 2008 at 6:25 pm |
[…] Hat Tip: Jaffapete […]
November 17, 2008 at 7:20 pm |
Just when you thought it was safe to go back in the water…..
November 18, 2008 at 9:23 am |
[…] tip: Jafapete « Right plans give away to rich at your […]
November 18, 2008 at 7:15 pm |
Trotter is revealing himself to be somewhat erratic. These Net newbies take a while to settle down. Fascinating to watch, though. If I had any advice for him it would be not take everything SO seriously.
You can be correct every day and people will hate you for debunking their personal myths and challenging their prejudices, preconceptions and ignorance.
Welcome to the Internet. Prepare to be boarded. 😉
November 19, 2008 at 9:20 am |
The reaction to Trotter has been fascinating. The right has reacted hysterically – but given the general paranoid style of the right blogsphere that is hardly a surprise. What has really been interesting has been the left wing reaction. To my eyes the comfortably middle class left wing toffs of places like Public Address, and the intellectually lofty norightturn or feminist sites have reacted with marked hostility to Trotter’s cloth cap real politik. Trotter himself remarked on NatRad that he thought the blogsphere to be a largely irrelevant place to lives of real working class New Zealanders, and at first blush you would have to agree with him. It seems to me that the blogsphere consists of about 10% of the population – the Chardonnay socialists and the ACToid bully boys. However, Trotter in those comments missed the importance of who is on which side of the digital divide when it comes to influencing opinion makers.
When the Labour Party looks at reasons for its defeat this year, the role of Limbaugh-like right wing attack sites in setting the agenda of the debate has to addressed. It seems any cursory reading of the musing of political editors and op-ed writers in our major daily papers would indicate that they are no longer just interviewing their typewriters – they have web browsers and they often are regurgitating right wing attack talking points. The use of Cameron Slater and David Farrar to launder sexual smears and whispering campaigns into the mass media is now documented. David Farrar has managed to use his blog as a launching point to pass himself off as an independent commentator in the wider media, and if the web stats are to be believed the sleazy Slater has one of the most read blogs in the land.
The general online “left wing” response to all this has been tardy and a lot of the leftists frankly come across as a lot of intellectually elitist pussies. A good example would be the over-intellectualising tosh served up by Deborah over at “in a strange land” that saw her end up voting for the Maori Party. Another would be the flaccid and half hearted political energy this time round of Russell Brown over at Public Address.
The left – that is, the left that rolls up its sleeves and gets involved with real workers at trade union and party activist levels – has to develop a far more vigorous and street fighting response online to set the agenda of opinion makers, and that is why I think pseudo-left’s general nose holding reaction to Trotter’s aggressive and thematically cohesive writing is symptomatic of how and why the right came to dominate the op-ed agenda on the internet and onto the mass media.
November 20, 2008 at 6:21 pm |
[…] flavour, not just domestic. It is a must read for Adam. A recent post was in fact the pick-up of a comment on another post, on Chris Trotter’s new blog, by Tom Semmens. JP thought the comments were worthy of Guest […]