According to a new ranking by BlogNetNews.com, PubDef.net is the 7th most influential political blog in Missouri.
The site (more specifically BlogNetNews.com/Missouri) launched a new feature this week that ranks which Missouri state politics and news blogs are having the most influence on the direction of conversation in the state blogosphere.
Considering we haven’t even heard of, let alone visited, half the other blogs on the list, we’re not sure how realistic the ranking is, but we’ll take the compliment just the same.
“Our rankings come from data provided in your RSS feeds, data from the activity of readers on BlogNetNews.com and data about Internet traffic from third parties,” says the site’s operators.
Each Sunday morning at 12:01 AM, BlogNetNews.com will release a new top 20 list of the blogs “most powerfully shaping opinion in the Missouri blogosphere.” Here’s the link.
And here’s the current list:
1 Tony’s Kansas City 2 Fired Up! Missouri - 3 The Turner Report 4 Politics Blog 5 KY3 Political Notebook 6 The KC Blue Blog 7 PUB DEF 8 CHATTER 9 Show Me Progress 10 Branson Missouri 11 Rhetorica: Press-Politics Journal 12 Blog CCP 13 Ozarks Messenger 14 Arch City Chronicle News 15 Ozarks Politics 16 The Source 17 The Kansas City Post 18 Corner of the Sky 19 Missouri Politics 20 Gone Mild
Okay, so this is probably a great time to encourage you to ADVERTISE on this “influential” website. Rates are reasonable. Call (314) 260-7321 or email us for a quote.
And if you’re not an advertiser, but still want to support PubDef and help us expand our coverage, SUBSCRIBE for only $7.00 a month. Get a quarterly DVD of our best videos and a warm and fuzzy feeling for helping to keep independent media alive in St. Louis.
The folks at St. Louis Magazine were nice enough to send two attractive women over today to present me with a plaque and a couple of early copies of their July issue, which includes yours truly on its annual “A-List”.
Thank you to the editors for taking note of our efforts. And thanks especially to the thousands of people who read this blog regularly and care enough about what’s going on around us to search for information, work on campaigns, and (if you’re really nuts) run for office.
From an article in the Kansas City Star on the KC mayoral race:
Still, the Internet is a good way for candidates to communicate with their base and raise funds, said Antonio French, a St. Louis political observer and sometime campaign adviser. It has the advantage of being cheap, potentially yielding more votes for the dollars spent…
French acknowledged that the blogging era is still in its infancy, is more prevalent in middle class and affluent neighborhoods, and has yet to really make an impact in poorer, minority or rural communities.
In this week’s issue of the St. Louis Business Journal, which includes a long list of the “Most Influential St. Louisans”, I am for some reason listed as one of the most “influential” people in media.
“[Antonio] French, the brain and brawn behind PUB DEF Weekly, leads a never-ending town hall meeting at www.pubdef.net, telling residents what they missed while they were too busy to care — or, we hope, just too busy. The blogger has been all over the ongoing tussle involving St. Louis Board of Education President Veronica O’Brien and Superintendent Diana Bourisaw, prompting scores of comments from supporters and opponents of a proposed state takeover of schools. He keeps an eagle eye on the Board of Aldermen too. If anyone understands better than French that the devil’s in the details, we have yet to be introduced.”
Thank you to the writer of those flattering words. I do wish, however, that I and the thousands of people who clearly expressed their opposition to a state takeover, including nearly every state legislator from the City, did have more influence over those outside people that clearly have more power over our city than we do.
Other “influential” media people on the list were: Kevin Mowbray, the publisher of the “once-admired” (that’s according to the Biz Journal) Post-Dispatch; Donald Suggs, publisher of the “once admired” (that’s according to me) St. Louis American; TV station managers Lynn Beall (KSDK), Allan Cohen (KMOV), and Spencer Koch (KTVI); radio station manager Tim Dorsey (KTRS); radio host and Donnybrooker Charlie Brennan and fellow KMOXer Dave Simmons; and my fellow bloggers, John Combest and Dave Drebes. Meanwhile, our blogger buddy Steve Patterson is listed among the region’s “Influential Steves”.
From reporter Dave Helling’s story in Sunday’s Kansas City Star:
Antonio French’s St. Louis-based Web site, www.pubdef.net, is one of the best-known and most frequently viewed political Web sites in Missouri. French shoots, edits and posts dozens of videos of candidates and officeholders each week — often catching them in embarrassing situations that provide fodder for their opponents.
“I think video and blogs have introduced the 24-hour news cycle to local politics,” French said. “That’s good for the public, but possibly bad for the politicians who don’t think before they speak.” Last year, French shot video that became an issue in the Claire McCaskill-Jim Talent campaign.
Ever wonder which political blogger is most likely to be President of the United States? (Yeah, me neither.) Well, the folks at the Columbia Tribune did and you might be surprised by the primary outcomes.
Click here to read Jason Rosenbaum’s fantasy blogger Presidential scenario.
And let me just thank the good people of Arizona, North Dakota and Delaware. But Missouri, what happened? No love for PubDef?
Tom Weber, of local NPR station KWMU, reports that Cape Girardeau-area Rep. JoAnn Emerson, a Republican, was especially supportive of Congressional Democrats’ so-called 100-hour agenda.
Emerson voted for five of the six bills that passed during the 100 hours. Her only “no” vote was for the bill that implements the rest of the 9/11 commission’s recommendations.
You may have seen his “I Have a Dream” speech before, but watch it again now if only to marvel at how great of an orator Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was, and how large a void his murder left in American politics.
The Missouri History Museum has purchased former Mayor Freeman Bosley, Jr.’s Big Jake’s BBQ on Delmar and, according to The Pacer neighborhood newsletter, plans to raze the building and put in a new “multi-modal” building.
Closed for a few months now, Big Jake’s hosted several political meetings over the years and was one of the few places in town you could buy barbecued turkey legs so big they hung out of the Styrofoam to-go boxes. R.I.P. Big Jake’s.
An article in Friday’s Post-Dispatch gives props to Pub Def for our political coverage throughout 2006. Thanks to political reporter Jo Mannies for the love.
French, who operates Pubdef, said political activists at all levels had better get used to the relentless characteristic of these blog sites.
As he sees it: “The Internet has introduced the 24-hour news cycle to local politics.”
