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Online Journalism News

Guardian collective comment blog launches

Posted: 14/03/06 By: Jemima Kiss
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The Guardian launched its Comment is free project today with a lengthy column on blog power by US columnist Arianna Huffington.

She hails the blogosphere as the saviour of traditional media: "Big media isn't dead; it's critically ill but will actually be saved by the transfusion of passion and immediacy of the blogging revolution.

"Blogging and the new media are transforming the way news and information are disseminated, as evidenced by the number of traditional media outlets, like this one, dipping their collective toe into the blog pond.

"The blogosphere is now the most vital news source in America."

HuffingtonPost.com is cited as a major influence on the Guardian project. It was co-founded by Ms Huffington in May last year and draws together comment by a wide range of commentators and celebrities; this week featuring George Clooney on his liberal politics.

Comment is free is based on a similar model. More than 200 columnists, commentators and experts will contribute to the site, which will also publish all comment from the Guardian and Observer newspapers.

Photographer Dan Chung has a section showcasing his latest work, currently from the 2006 New Orleans Mardi Gras, and acclaimed political cartoonist Steve Bell makes his Guardian Unlimited debut after 25 years in the print edition.

Editors from across the Guardian and Observer are also contributing to an editors' blog on Comment is free; not 'the official voice' of the newspaper but observations on developments and editorial decisions behind the newspaper and the website.

More features, including podcasts of political and cultural debates, will be added in the next few weeks.

Introducing the blog, site editor Georgina Henry claimed that Comment is free is the first collective comment blog by a UK newspaper - a recognition by the Guardian that focus of opinion and debate is moving online.

"Unless we move with it, we're failing our journalists and future generations of readers," she said.

"We need to expand and deepen the debate which takes place every day in our newspapers and for which we have an unrivalled reputation.

"Readers, too, need to be at the heart of the conversation, and much more engaged than print allows."

The project title 'Comment is free' refers to a quote by former Guardian editor CP Scott, writing in the newspaper's centenary year in 1921: "Comment is free, but facts are sacred. The voice of opponents no less than that of friends has a right to be heard."