Guardian - One of the best kept literary secrets of the decade was revealed last night when 34-year-old scientist Dr Brooke Magnanti announced she was the writer masquerading as call girl Belle de Jour.

The author behind the bestselling books detailing her secret life as a prostitute decided to come out to one of her fiercest critics, Sunday Times columnist India Knight, after claiming anonymity had become "no fun". "I couldn't even go to my own book launch party", she said.

Until last week, even her agent was unaware of her name. But now Magnanti, a respected specialist in developmental neurotoxicology and cancer epidemiology in a hospital research group in Bristol, has spoken of the time six years ago she worked as a £300 an hour prostitute working through a London escort agency. Magnanti turned to the agency in the final stages of her PhD thesis when she ran out of money. She was already an experienced science blogger and began writing about her experiences in a web diary later adapted into books and a television drama starring Billie Piper.

Arran Frood | Oct 6

BBC - Conspiracy theorists have used the internet to co-ordinate increasingly slick attacks on the accepted versions of events, but now a group of scientists and sceptics has decided it's time to organise and fight back.

Conspiracy theories are pervasive and popular.

A poll for the Scripps Howard media organisation in 2006 suggested 36% of Americans suspected government involvement or deliberate inaction in the 9/11 attacks, and belief in a Kennedy conspiracy ran at 40% in the same poll.

A decade after Princess Diana's death, one survey found a fifth of Britons believed she was murdered. And to millions across the world, 2009's Apollo Moon landing 40th anniversary was a hollow sham because we have never been there.

Conspiracy theories predate the internet but the web has provided a fast, accessible platform for groups to unite, gather research and disseminate information without even meeting or leaving their houses.

While many people find them harmless fun, others believe there is a darker truth - that conspiracy theories are rewriting history, warping the present and altering the future. Enough is enough they say - it's time to fight back.

The best email EVER

from Kristen Atkinson <[REDACTED]>

to ken@wonkette.com

cc jim@wonkette.com

date Thu, Aug 20, 2009 at 3:26 AM

subject my story

Dear Wonkette editors,

I posted a very serious article recently in Townhall.com about witchcraft in the White House, and later realized that your website had made a farce out of it. I saw that your staff and readers made a lot of extremely cruel comments about me and my story. Why are you people so rude? Does anybody take anything seriously anymore?

Do you really, truly, seriously think it is OK for a president to use a forged birth certificate? Do you actually believe it is appropriate for a man who was raised a Muslim to pretend he is a Christian and go to a church for 20 years with an anti-American preacher? Do you really want a president who was brainwashed by communists since he was a child, up through university, to hate America to be our president? Do you think that it is fine if a family member of the president defiles the White House with voodoo? Don't you know what fate could befall our nation as a result of allowing Satanic forces to gather over the White House?

After 8 years of a president sent by God to lead the American people and rescue us from the horrors of 911 and Islamo-fascists, it now boils down to this? How incredibly tragic. You folks don't really seem to understand the extreme peril that our nation confronts. Stop making fun of me. Take off your blinders! Wake up!

Respectfully, Kristen

Man, who needs to make fun of Kristen Atkinson...when she's doing a bang-up job all by herself? I could care less that I despise everything she believes in and stands for. It's a free country, and she's free to hold whatever opinions get her through the night. What I find so stunningly amusing is that Atkinson is genuinely offended by the idea that anyone would find her breathless bleatings to be the height of the comedic art. (STOP MAKING FUN OF ME!!)

rcfp | Aug 18

A blogger lost his bid to keep his identity secret after a judge in New York City ruled that a fashion model had established a legitimate defamation claim against the blogger.

Establishing a legitimate underlying claim is necessary under New York rules of discovery before a subpoena to reveal an anonymous speaker will be enforced, according to the court.

The blogger had created a site called "Skanks in NYC," and had featured model Liskula Cohen in several postings. One posting labelled her a "psychotic, lying, whoring ... skank." more

** Judge: 'Skanks in NYC' blogger may be unmasked
** Vogue model Liskula Cohen wins right to unmask offensive blogger

The model was looking forward last night to discovering the identity of the alleged acquaintance who insulted her.

Content thieves, be warned: The AP isn’t sitting idly and taking your shit anymore.

While the 'protect, point and pay' new registry will make it easier to target blogs that distribute content through automated systems, it will not alert the AP when others manually rewrite stories or excerpt passages.

Agonistas can rest easy:

I would really like to ask all bloggers to take a look at this letter from a local 'indigenous' activist here on SXM giving a warning to bloggers. This Leopold James has been taken to task or criticized in blogs on our local site SXM Private Eye in the past. He doesn't like it.

Anyway, it's been blogged about by my friend LH and we would really like to hear some support and thoughts from the blogging world on this matter.

Caribdude

Fear, Threats and Intimidation - SXM PE

Paul Sheehan writes in the SMH - Several teenagers at an elite Sydney girls school are coming to terms with the full magnitude of their public betrayal via the internet. Where to begin? One has had her genitalia discussed in anatomical detail. Another has had her face likened to a koala's. A third has learnt that her circle of friends is not friendly at all: "She thinks she's best friends with lots of people but they actually hate her."

Unbelievable. I'm a cynical swine and a cheerful warrior, but even I have a limit.

Mish wants to reduce government salaries.

It's time to roll back the salaries of all elected and appointed government officials at every level including local, state, and federal. It would be nice to see this happen voluntarily instead of by force.

Why do I read this gold-fetishizing Austrian nutbar again?

I saw Bush for what he was before he got elected, I begged my US friends to vote for Gore, but they wanted the tax cuts Bush promised. Boy, how different would it have been if we had the Lock box Gore wanted for a rainy day and done a better job in Afganistan and not gone to war in Iraq. I wonder if there is some parallel universe branching off somewhere where Gore did get elected and life is 'dull and boring'.

Anyway, I didn't start this blog to talk about the global economic meltdown, I wanted to bring up torture, black prisons, rendition, kidnappings and other related matters, the ones that the US sppears to be shoving in the closet, trying hard to forget, and move on from. Personally, I'm starting to get disappointed in Obama, he's trying too damn hard to be Mr Nice in the middle guy, bringing everyone on board, but it is now starting to work against him. Sort of like a candle in the wind, weak, wavering and unsure. (Seriously Dude, you were given a majority and mandate, now call your party to order and most of all, figure out where you stand.)

Anyway, back to Torture. I want to remind you all that while hiding skeletons in the closet and trying to forget sounds like the simplest way to deal with it all, it's something the rest of the World is not going to let you forget. It's far better to confront it.

So, here's this story about US torture where two top judges state that the Bush Administration threatened the United Kingdom to break off intelligence co-operation over investigations of abuse and torture.

Shami Chakrabarti, director of Liberty, said last night: "Despite best efforts to shine a light on the grubbiest aspects of the 'war on terror', the Foreign Office has claimed that the Obama administration maintained a previous US threat to reconsider intelligence sharing unless our judges kept this shameful skeleton in the closet.

If this is true, then Obama has just lost me. I want to know if the Liberal blogsphere and Americans online are going to raise hell about this and force the MSM to address it, or if it will just get filed away in that closet.

Caribdude

Tehran | December 30

AFP - The Iranian judiciary confirmed on Tuesday that Hossein Derakhshan,a prominent Iranian-Canadian blogger, is under arrest over remarks he allegedly made about key figures in the Shiite faith, local media reported.

"Among the accusations, there are issues involving 'Aemmeh Athar' and some charges that have been made," judiciary spokesman Ali Reza Jamshidi said, referring to the 12 successors of the Prophet Mohammed who are central figures in Shiite Islam.

His highly political Internet diary, hoder.com, has not been updated since October 30 and some reports outside Iran said he had been arrested on November 1 shortly after arriving in Tehran on a private visit.

Ed Howker | Nov 6

The Independent - Why are we asking this now?

Communities Minister Hazel Blears made a speech to the Hansard Society yesterday in which she criticised political bloggers in the UK. "Political blogs are written by people with disdain for the political system and politicians, who see their function as unearthing scandals, conspiracies and perceived hypocrisy," she said. Conservative grandee Lord Baker has described the comments as "extraordinary". He said: "She needs to tune into the modern world. People have a right to say what they think and if she doesn't like it she can blog back". However, Blears maintains that: "Until political blogging adds value to our political culture, by allowing new voices, ideas and legitimate protest and challenge, and until the mainstream media reports politics in a calmer, more responsible manner, it will continue to fuel a culture of cynicism and despair."

interesting points are raised, that also apply to US bloggers and press

Dan Margoglies | Oct 13

Kansas City Star - Local blogger Dan Ryan has never been sued for his postings, although one commenter whose anti-Semitic ravings he deleted accused him of slander and threatened "to own my house."

Even so, Ryan, whose daily musings about politics, homemade beer and whatever else strikes his fancy appear at www.gonemild.com, said he was not overly concerned about getting sued.

"I have the benefit of being fundamentally judgment-proof — like most bloggers," he joked, referring to his relative lack of wealth. Also, he said, "I try to avoid anything slanderous or anything that would be actionable."

Ryan's caution may stem from his training as an attorney. Most bloggers, though, are less attuned to the niceties of the law. An increasing number are finding themselves on the wrong end of a lawsuit.

Jacqui Cheng | September 24

Ars Technica - It's the second half of 2008, and contrary to some doomsday predictions, blogging has yet to reach its peak. The blogosphere has continued to expand, according to Technorati's State of the Blogosphere 2008 report, and we are now beginning to learn more about what powers the blogging community. Though growth has slowed, bloggers are apparently becoming pretty savvy at making money while pursuing their blogging interests.

133 million blogs have been tracked by Technorati between 2002 and now. This number is almost double the 72 million tracked as of March of 2007, and quite a bit higher than the 35 million from spring of 2006 and 8 million from 2005. Though blogging in general is still on the upswing, the growth rate has clearly slowed in recent years—a trend that we noted last year as well.


more, with some interesting analysis...

Riazat Butt | Sept 19

The Guardian -

A Turkish court has banned internet users from viewing the official Richard Dawkins website after a Muslim creationist claimed its contents were defamatory and blasphemous.

Adnan Oktar, who writes under the pen name of Harun Yahya, complained that Dawkins, a fierce critic of creationism and intelligent design, had insulted him in comments made on forums and blogs.

According to Oktar's office, Istanbul's second criminal court of peace banned the site earlier this month on the grounds that it "violated" Oktar's personality.

Oktar, a household name in Turkey, has used hundreds of books, pamphlets and DVDs to contest Darwin's theory of evolution. In 2006 his publishers sent out 10,000 copies of the Atlas of Creation, a lavish book rejecting evolution on every one of its 800 pages.

Dawkins, one of the recipients, described the book as "preposterous". On his website the British biologist and popular science writer said he was at "a loss to reconcile the expensive and glossy production values of this book with the breathtaking inanity of the content".

I believe in being good blog-world citizens. With that in mind, give this post at Corrente a read and help out if possible. Legal threats like this are simply stupid.

June 25 | Roy Greenslade | The Guardian

The debate over blogging's usefulness to journalism tends to get stuck in a cul de sac, mainly because too few people - well, too few journalists - treat it seriously. At conferences I've attended recently, speakers have referred to blogging as little more than a sad ego trip. It is not regarded as having any real public service value.

I'll scream if I hear yet again that the blogosphere is a form of anarchy, a cacophony of self-centred and mischievous voices who are either talking to each other or talking to no-one at all. I'm not denying that aspect, though I don't see why people sitting at computer terminals day after day and downloading their thoughts should threaten civilisation as we know it.

What is also clear, most obviously in peer to peer blogging, is that people are engaged with each other as never before. Without any institutional or corporate coaxing, people are forming cyber communities in which they converse endlessly about their interests.

I say this as a preliminary to explaining why journalists, especially print veterans like me, are so suspicious of bloggers. We have spent our lives dominating conversations. No, that's wrong of course. We did not converse at all. We lectured. We provided the information that people feasted on in order to hold their own conversations.

Seth Sutel – 17 June | New York
(AP) — The Associated Press, following criticism from bloggers over an AP assertion of copyright, plans to meet this week with a bloggers' group to help form guidelines under which AP news stories could be quoted online.

Jim Kennedy, the AP's director of strategic planning, said Monday that he planned to meet Thursday with Robert Cox, president of the Media Bloggers Association, as part of an effort to create standards for online use of AP stories by bloggers that would protect AP content without discouraging bloggers from legitimately quoting from it.

It Takes a Village

Anglachel's Journal

Once in a while, a comment thread is far, far more interesting than the original post.

That happened yesterday on TalkLeft when BTD posted "Document the Atrocities," a short snark at Atrios/Duncan Black (Eschaton) specifically and the Blogger Boyz generally, about the way they no longer challenge the MSM, and giving props to the Incomparable Bob Somerby for always calling the media (major and minor) on their lies, smears, bullshit, and general mendacity.

Just curious. It has mine. There are several sites I used to read regularly that I just don't visit anymore. A couple of them I actually refuse to visit again. I keep my bookmarks organized into two basic folders on my toolbar in Firefox. One is my regular reading list and the other is for dumping new finds into. I occasionally reorder them based on how often I return to certain sites, keeping them handy. I've noticed that my 'top 20' have changed dramatically leading me to wonder if this is true for others and whether or not this election is changing the landscape of the blogosphere.

Its funny, I guess, the process of attachment. A trust grew from years of reading some sites that ended in a feeling of abandonment when I realized I had, as is my wont, naively granted too many free passes because I liked them.

There is, now, a window. That window opens as Hillary's window for the presidency closes. Obama is, by all of his promises, a neo-liberal and neo-classical president. He's going to make you, the poor, pay for the problems. That's what neo-classical economic prescriptions say, if there is inflation, then something is either regulated, allowing little people to buy too much of it, and that means the solution is to deregulate, privatize, desubsidize, or pass a regressive tax, that will force the small people to make hard choices.

See the price at the gas pump? That's neo-classical economics at work. You, the little people, are using too much gas. That's easy to fix, cut your wages, cut your jobs and let the price go up up up up up until you get it through your head that you, the little people are going to pay a gas tax to bail out the banking system. And you are going to say

"Thank you President Obama, may I have another?"

That's why there is a moment coming, and that moment is with the collapse of Hillary. You see the liberals, and new liberals, went from one candidate to another on the margins: Edwards, Richardson, Dodd - each one with his strengths and weaknesses. Finally the wall came, and they had to choose between somewhat more economically liberal Hillary and some what more open to new people Obama. The fight got vicious, because the stakes are so small. Krugman pushed Edwards and then Hillary in his own way.

We all owe a debt of gratitude to Jimmy Carter. This is a man that has consistently tried to do what others in the political arena seem unable to do, and that is to live up to their own expectations, regardless of the political costs. His recent trip to the Middle-East was Carter at his finest. While he understood all to well that the compromised, immoral regimes of both Israel and Washington did not support his mission and were unlikely to approve anything that came out of his meetings with Hamas, he chose to go in order to illustrate to the world what these two governments are really about. I believe Carter was successful in illustrating that neither America nor Israel want to pursue a realistic solution for peace. If anything, his visit proved once again, that Israel seeks not peace, but capitulation.

I have been writing about the same things for years now. I have been writing against the loss of our freedoms, the draconian laws that have been enacted in order to “protect” us from people that “hate us for our freedom”, I have written about the corporations that have tied this nation to war and more war. Even though my message has been the same, I find that my writing has fallen on deaf ears as of late. In fact, my writing, because of my criticism of this phony two-party system that has led us to where we are now, I have been banned from OpEdNews.com, DailyKos.com.TPMMuckracker.com, and left me with a small sidebar on SmirkingChimp.com.

My stepson Patrick had a blogger in Iraq Friend his LiveJournal some years ago and I marveled that the people overseas were actually allowed such web latitude. It was a silver lining in the mire to me. It wasn't long ago now though that I read all that had been curtailed. Apparently whatever I had read was incorrect or at least not completely correct. I'm a bit lost now on what the truth is.
    Then today I come across this ThinkProgress piece on the military's contemplation of how they might blog their message across:

Military report: secretly 'recruit or hire bloggers.'

Excuse me if I offend anyone in this article, but I would like to know what happened to the Democratic Party? I always thought of Democrats as those that supported Unions, workers, the middle-class, civil liberties and silly things like that. One thing I was also taught to do was to follow the money when it comes to whom really is supporting who in things such as criminal enterprises and of course, politics. I have been around for a while now, and I believe that I’m just as aware of what’s happening in my own country as anyone else. In fact, I believe that I’m really more aware of what’s happening than most. I am a voracious reader and I have a lot of time on my hands and I actually try to dig behind the rhetoric I hear. What I have found amazes me.

Mick Fealty, one of my favorite bloggers, has a great post up on the virtues of blogging:

Doris Lessing, a novelist of great emotional intelligence . . . appears to back [a] latter day Luddite agenda saying the Internet has "seduced a whole generation by its inanities" and, worse, "even quite reasonable people may find a whole day has passed in blogging etc?"

It strikes me that if all journalism was to be judged by its lowest common denominator, you might come to the same conclusion about print newspapers. But there are intimations that actually, whoever you are, or however badly you do it, blogging is good for you.

Well said. More here. For the record, I am a fan of Lessing's work and always viewed her as a far-sighted novelists in many ways. So, this attack on blogging is strange.