We’re a bit late to this party, for a number of reasons (no doubt including modesty, but more of that later). Trevor Cook reported last month on some research conducted by Dr Colin McLeod and presented to the MEAA’s Public Affairs Convention. The answer, according to McLeod, is yes. Over at gatewatching, Jason Wilson linked to Cook’s post with this commentary:
I seem to recall that last year that we copped a bit of stick for suggesting that Larvatus Prodeo was an influential blog. This was, of course, partly premised on Axel’s issuecrawler analysis of issue networks in the Australian blogosphere. The value of this analysis was disputed at the time, by other influential bloggers.
We’re certainly not universally popular in the blogosphere as this post indicates. But to forestall the anticipated flood of loud condemnations, it’s worth pausing to examine the nature of the claim being made in McLeod’s and Axel Bruns’ research, and what sort of “influence” they’re measuring, which I’ll do over the fold. I imagine that won’t actually forefend the loud condemnations, because there are a few folks out there who are obsessed with their big swinging hits. No names, no packdrill. They can out themselves by linking here.
I’ll also take the chance to update folks on our advertising performance and site stats for May, which was something of a bumper month for both.
Let’s problematise the notion of influence first. This is an excerpt of a report of the convention session where McLeod’s research was presented:
One of the insights from the SEER analyzes they did is that the second most influential online source in last year’s Australian federal election, after the Australian Broadcasting Corporation website, was Larvatus Prodeo, a group blog of academics and commentators.
Now that’s putting it rather broadly, and no one is claiming (least of all us) that we’re out there swinging votes. But - in contrast to the so-called “A-list” in America - that’s not what we’re trying to do. We’re much more interested in fostering conversations about politics and public affairs, and that’s what the research finds we’ve been successful in doing. So “influence” is probably a bit of a misnomer, and we wouldn’t answer the question in the affirmative. But if there’s independent research using a similar methodology to some of the academic research conducted at QUT confirming that we’re in a central node of online conversations in this domain, then we’re chuffed.
Let’s have a look at how this works. Here’s a diagram from QUT researcher Barry Saunders, and an explanation he’s provided of what it shows. You’ll need to click on the thumbnail once you go to the linked page, because reducing the size of the diagram distorts its presentation of the data.
As part of my PhD research on mapping the Australian blogosphere, (part of the Opportunities in Citizen Journalism ARC Linkage Project of QUT, SBS, Online Opinion, the Brisbane Institute and Cisco Systems), I have been tracking the relative influence of Australian blogs within political discussions. In the attached example I tracked the main conversation centres around the discussion of the apology to the Indigenous Australians using the Issuecrawler web mapping tool, as you can see, Larvatusprodeo is the central blog in this discussion.
My research is seeking to uncover the shape of political discussion online, to see whether it exhibits the attributes of a public sphere. You can read more about the methodology I’m using here (it’s a work in progress) and follow gatewatching for more updates.
I understand that a number of similar analyses of Australian political events in the recent past shown by Saunders at a QUT seminar demonstrated basically the same thing.
We haven’t actually seen the research from McLeod (waiting on it is one of the reasons this post is belated), but we understand from Trevor Cook that the methodology was similar. So there you have it.
Those interested in these things might also like to have a look at Axel Bruns’ two most recent posts at gatewatching, where he’s used Leximancer to do some content analysis of LP, Club Troppo and The Other Cheek, and has produced some concept maps. The conclusion?
What’s it all mean? Well, in the first place, and most importantly for our further research, this first exploration of our data indicates the validity of our research approach. In both the frequency data described in the first part of this post, and the maps presented here, some clear differences between the three blogs become evident - as anyone familiar with these blogs, and the thematic and stylistic differences between them, would expect.
What this enables us to do is to come to grips, on a quantitative basis, with Australian political blogs - we can measure and distinguish their thematic direction overall, and identify how this might change over time as the political cycle proceeds. It helps us get away from the otherwise almost inevitable shortcut descriptions of specific blogs as ‘left’, ‘centre’, and ‘right’; in the analysis presented here, for example, a clear distinction between the political wonkery and gossip of OC and the policy analysis of Troppo has emerged, with LP perhaps sitting somewhere in the middle (and just to be clear, neither of these descriptions imply value judgments - a mature political blogosphere probably needs all of this, and more).
Now to the stats and revenue report for May.
As I was saying, we had a bumper month. It panned out like this (from our server stats):
Unique visitors: 110106
Number of visits: 225561
Pages: 1563889
Hits: 4162852
Bandwidth served: 58.49 GB
The vast majority of the traffic was from Australia, and these stats exclude traffic generated by robots or worms.
With regard to advertising, we don’t have the report from Nielsen yet with the numbers of ads served, but we can report that the gross revenue was $7,231.16 gross or $3615.58 net for the month of May.
Details of how it all works are in this post. We’ve now paid off the costs of renovating the site, but I should note that because of the lags in earning revenue and being paid, we’re still yet to see any of the money! You might also recall that last month Mark asked for donations to assist in his income support while he finishes his PhD. He gratefully acknowledges the receipt of $520 for this purpose, and also a loan from an LP commenter.
Please also recall this:
We also only get an ad impression (obviously) where people don’t have an ad-blocker plugin installed, or have disabled the plugin for LP.
At LP, we’ve always taken the view that the site as a whole is the creation of everyone who comments or lurks here as well as the posters, so I reckon pats on the back are due all round!
Update: Tim Watts at Tree of Knowledge on all this.
Update: Ken Parish comments on the research reported at gatewatching.
Good on you LP.
Couple of things. I have an ad blocker so had even forgotten you are running ads.
But more importantly and something you should consider. I read LP via RSS feed and don’t visit the site too often unless I am commenting.
I wonder how many other RSS subscribers there are out there.
Wow…just turned ad blocker off to check it out…turned it straight back on again having been reminded exactly why I have it.
Yes but…does Kev get to read LP in his briefs?
What sense of ‘in his briefs’ were you thinking of?
Danny,
Provided his briefs are on the outside of his pants.
Great news for LP, congrats. I am learning heaps, Thanks.
Andrew is going to be pissed off.
He’s Australia’s “most talked about columnist” according to his own paper. Or do you mean Mr Landeryou?
Steve D - LP has about 300 Google Reader subscribers, which is pretty easy to check if you just click the “add subscription” button and search for “Larvatus Prodeo”.
Google reader’s not the only RSS client, though.
Kim - weirdness, I had that little disclaimer written at the end of that comment but somehow deleted it…
I dunno how hard it is to check the subscription figures on other readers, does anyone else?
#8 The missing part of a nut.
Good job Mark.
Now lets say for the sake of the argument that LP is sorta, kinda, lika the Josh Marshall news-shop ‘Talking points memo’. Doesn’t that leave room for a ‘ Firedoglake’ ( Jane Hamsher) and/or a ‘Hullabaloo’ ( Digby)?
Just askin’
‘ Women hold up half the blogosky ‘
Congratulations to Mark and the team.
You’ll know you’ve really “arrived” when journos start acknowledging your threads as inspiration and/or sourcing of their stories. I have sometimes noticed a media story pop out out of nowhere after related discussion on blogs, and cannot help concluding that many journos must now use blogs as (a) sources for new story ideas and (b) venues for gathering a taste of the elusive “public opinion” (it’s easier than going down into the CBD and actually talking to people).
It would be nice to see the practice acknowledged a bit more in the press, but at the moment the word “blog” is covered in negative connotations associated with losers, petty bickering and crazy conspiracy theories. I can’t imagine where people got such impressions!
Let me know when you start hiring! LOL. Now I’ve gotta go deliver some more pizzas.
I’ve even noticed pollies picking up on some of our themes! But we’d be really lucky to ever get any credit.
I second gandhi. LP saves my sanity when the MSM are embroiled in the usual bulldust. Thank you LP for the wisdom of commentary and I really hope that you thrive and prosper, even if it means that the lazy journos out there in MSM are bottom feeding from this forum.Let’s face it , they could do worse. They could be going to Mr. “whats his name”.
Yep! And LP has women bloggers, unlike other prominent group political blogs like Club Troppo.
/runs away
We’ve had our first loud denunciation!
http://brissietobrizzle.wordpress.com/2008/06/10/i-condemn-larvatus-prodeo-and-their-so-called-influence/
And thanks everyone for your kind words!
Update: Tim Watts at Tree of Knowledge on all this.
To be fair to Ken, he’s been trying to get more women bloggers. I thought long and hard about doing what Rafe does and posting at both Troppo and Catallaxy, and I’ll still be doing Missing Link once my exams are finished. On balance, though, LE & I were more interested in getting our own place.
Well, I guess they used to have Sophie Masson, and Wendy, and jen very occasionally.
To be honest, I think Troppo is punching a bit below its weight at the moment. I assume Nick Gruen is much busier than he used to be now that he’s the go-to guy for Rudd government economic enquiries, and a lot of days the only post up is the Missing Link - which is a pity, as effectively they’re feeding off others’ content rather than generating their own (not that I quibble for a moment with the concept of ML and the work that goes into it, but it would be good to see more actual original posting at Troppo.)
Really, I got frist! *blushes*
I love LP, but I do question what influential means, and if it’s even possible for such a word to have a non-subjective meaning in this sense.
Now, if we _knew_ that policy makers, and politicians (I would say media, but their influence is equally subjective) read LP, and showed evidence of changing, responding etc. Sure, then it would be influential. But beyond some continuity (and the redoubtable Andrew Bartlett), we don’t. No blogs do.
But when Joe Schmoes like myself - lovable though we are - read; it’s not really influencing a lot, is it? And, much as it pains me to admit, I read LP because I tend to agree with most of the thinking, not the other way around.
I dunno, the political studies that I’ve seen about media influence show that people tend to sniff, but not inhale. I don’t see why blogs would be any different.
But regardless, I don’t think that LP needs to be influential, etc. It’s interesting, diverse, and fun, that’s more than enough for me.
Cheers!
Tim Watts in the post I’ve linked to does a good job of distinguishing between different meanings of influence in this context, and note also my scepticism in the post itself.
Once towards the end of my time in the public service I was greeted by a bloke in the street. I didn’t know him from Adam. Anyway he told me that 20 years earlier or so I’d made some suggestions about what he might do with his life. He’d followed my suggestions and everything had worked out quite wonderfully. So he was thanking me.
I still didn’t even have a glimmer of memory. I was inclined to believe it was actually me, and was more than a little astonished that he’d taken the slightest bit of notice of what I’d said. I resolved that I’d have to be more careful in future!
So I have very low expectations that I might influence anyone in any way, and feel I ought to put out a warning. If you take any notice of me, then be it on your own head! I take no responsibility at all.
We are the Borg!
Actually, no Kim, you are mistaken. You misread the original article. LP is Australia’s most influenza blog!
You know, most of that traffic is me refreshing Brian’s State of Origin thread. We getting another one, Brian?
Kim and All:
Yes, congratulations, of course …. and you have all done very well indeed
But for me, personally, Larvatus Prodeo is still an interesting and informative blog and it is often jolly good fun too. Whether it is the most influential political blog or not influential at all doesn’t matter one iota to me. What is far more important is that issues - and non-issues too - are put up here as topics and discussed intelligently and passionately. Sometimes topics are put up that attract few comments at all but yet they deal with vitally-important thought-provoking issues. Serious or silly or serendipidous, Saturday Salon and Lazy Sunday are my two must-reads on Larvatus Prodeo.
Among my own favorite blogs are Larvatus Prodeo …. the Bartlett Diaries [for raising issues and perspectives that are so often ignored by the mainstream media and the major parties] …. Catallaxy [for robust discussions of economics and society] …. Club Troppo [for its Missing Link - that wonderful doorway through Alice’s looking-glass] …. Ambit Gambit [for adding decency to the consevative side of politics] …. Kalimna [for yet another perspective on things - b.t.w., surprised he was banned - or was he only sin-binned?] …. and, of course, David Tiley’s Barista [delightfully eclectic, thought-provoking and never boring].
RobynneB [on 16]:
Can I “third” that motion …. or can we put it to a vote by acclamation?
Mercurius - who is the borg queen?
Jason at 28, I’ve just finished it and put it in the can. I’ll post it tomorrow.
A warning. It’s a bit different, but you can say what you like on the thread.
I have just taken a look at Mr. Clarke’s blog for the first time, having read his post here on the ABC thread, and clicked the link above to his site.
Mr. Clarke is no doubt an excellent teacher of economic theory and whatever else he professes to be qualified in on his blog.
His problem is that he extrepolates from his mastery of his own subject an unearned self perception of mastery of all others, and has assumed an arrogance and offensiveness of approach which subverts any merit in his argument and any desire in his reader to empathise with him.
His rude disdain for, and peremptory dismissal of, any view which does not accord with his own narrow vision of conservative Utopia is the mark of a flawed intellect, and puts any assessment of his not inconsiderable capacity in his own discipline in the same category as the appreciation of the genius of an idiot savant.
Now let’s see if he reproduces this commentary on his site with the same relish as he has made adverse comment on others.
hmmm…feels like eating spaghetti in a restaurant…havin’ a real munch out…oblivious to the stares, sauce & pasta doin’ messy artwork on yer chin…but ya don’t give a crap ’cause you’re in the zone…the ecstatic…the compulsive one.
Then ya look up & some in the restaurant are starin’ at ya. More than you realised. It occurs to you that you might’ve been makin’ too much noise in your enjoyment & activity. But fortunately some smile & give you the thumbs up. Some are drunker & noisier than you. Plenty just ignore you. It’s quite a meal. Tasty. And yer driven. So ya think “screw it!…I’m havin’ fun…gettin’ somethin’ out of it”. You pay your compliments to the chef & keep eating. When you get home you write about the restaurant. Then you look in the mirror & realise you are the Chef….kinda. Fluctuates.
You think. Time to cook. Serve others. Shrug off sense of being watched. Just DO.
Do your best. Enjoy the process. Gain satisfaction from the doing. If others enjoy it, get nutrients from your offerings…all the better.
Congrats Lav Prod. I like occasionally eating & cooking/creating & serving here…throwin’ the odd vege into the mix…
As I do on Road to Surfdom. I enjoys chillin’ to the music over there. As do a few others now & then. Music chat good here too. When Salon later becomes saloon…:)
Book chat stimulating too. Some movie talk. Know I must try to listen more, socialise more, drink less on weekend blogs. Part of my brain chemistry makeup makes that hard. Bloody genes. Sometimes too tight. But learning. Accident & head injury didn’t help methinks.
As for women bloggers, i think the best ones generally come here. Find their input insightful, illuminating & sometimes “out there”. Don’t agree w/ everything tho…but at least they/you don’t tar & feather me when I don’t. Probably deserve it sometimes…but risk taking worthwhile if it stirs the imagination & adds to debate.
Might add, plenty good sparkin’ of grey cells goes on over here. And sensible talk.
We like goin’ for it, flamin’, kickin’ totalitarian leaning butt…& gettin’ kooky over there sometimes at RTS. Sometimes suits me better there too if I’m not flowin’ downstream well…instead runnin’ w/ thoughts. Ken L. & others also do effective anti-war stuff. Like here sometimes.
Plenty of room on the street for various eating & cooking spaces…:) Diversity positive.
Glad you’re gettin’ heaps of vistors. You offer up tasty meals. Most of the time…:)
Good to see Gandhi cookin’ again. Spicey meals. And Andrew Bartlett makin’ the effort to stop in and provide worthwhile thoughts. And Lang Mack visitin’…always good for an insightful, down-to-earth chat & laugh. Great taste in music. And phillip gets me thinkin’ in code…:)
Time for bed. Good on ya Collective. Sleep well. Lots of things to discuss as the sun rises to a new day.
N’
sweet
You are that influential?
Where’s the responsibility? Where is the outrage at Kim Carr and Brumby’s $70 million corporate welfare package to Toyota?
Mark - you’re the free market dude intcha?!
There’s nothing about it on the LDP site. Carping about it here is hardly the best you can do.
Congratulations, LP.
Believe it or not, my main reason for going on LP is the threads on social and cultural issues. But I do enjoy the political blogs, especially when it gives me an opportunity to dump on the mad Right (which includes Ratty.) Some of you may have noticed I even dump on Rudd and the ALP occasionally (and will continue to do so if I feel its merited - the same criteria I use for the conservatives.)
But mostly I do it for the company. Thank you all, whatever your politics, for providing me so much fun and intellectual/political stimulation since I discovered you last year.
FDB,
That’s true. We should do better.
But Mark Bahnisch is more influential than me. Now this corporate welfare is simply a bad idea.
Well I certainly agree it’s a bad idea, particularly when they can and will be built more cheaply elsewhere - in countries with one of JWH’s fabulous bilateral agreements no less, e.g. Thailand - and thus won’t do a thing to change the fundamentally batshit crazy Australian car industry, nor do much about emissions.
This could be construed as off-topic on a group hug thread though!
Shameless self-promoters.
Mark H, there are some pertinent comments on another thread starting with Andrew Bartlett’s. Robert M usually does posts on that sort of thing.
He undoubtedly has other things to do, as do I. For me State of Origin is number one priority right now!
Pats on all backs, youse LP stars!
Update: Ken Parish comments on the research reported at gatewatching.
cheers.
Coming from a murdoch dominated town (Adelaide) where now, even the Messenger that would once lie innocuously next to the bleaching dog turds on the front lawn, has become another one of his poisonous packages - thanks Julie Bishop - LP is oxygen.
Your “influence” for me is supplying the information, language and clarity of thought that helps solidify my own opinion. Gold.
And the links…
Also, I agree that your messages are getting out there - unacknowledged of course - because many themes that get dicussed elsewhere in blogs and in the MSM can be chronologically tracked back to here.
thanks again
Congratulations
If anyone is interested, LP has 82 subscribers in Bloglines. I use the RSS feed summaries to choose which posts I come to the site to read - Bloglines doesn’t include the comments, which are often the best part of the posts.
“Update: Ken Parish comments on the research reported at gatewatching.”
Kim, ‘For the Snark was a Boojum, you see.’ I think I know what it means & why I don’t visit that island anymore. Plenty of policy discussion full of snarkery…where wigs & crowns are worn. Shame really. But such is life in the places of rarefied air.
“Is Larvatus Prodeo Australia’s most influential political blog?”
Not so much for me since you cut down on the pin up threads.
Perhap the question could be better rephrased as:
“Is Larvatus Prodeo Australia’s most influential current affrays blog?”
Fuck Rudd said this, the pundits said that and Nelson will say this. No one is ever surprised but always outraged.
Personally I’d rather discuss the looming problematic fun of dirty Russian/Bollywood whacko/PRC cyber units gone private/US guerilla entrepreneurs netentertaiment centipede opertations, running off data haven servers, that are well on their way to making Slitscan look like the Drudge Report -rather than the usual dull and ritualised aAustralian political theatre. The latter is like kabuki without the dynamic stage action and surprise endings. The former’s gonna be our future.
MUST have those moments too…agree w/ Nabakov.
Bloglines doesn’t include the comments, which are often the best part of the posts.
On that point, I’d like to encourage more readers to get involved with the comments! To think that LP has such traffic, and yet so many of the comments come from the same people (often pushing the same tired arguments) is rather a disappointment really.
I know websites comments can get a bit out of hand on “anything goes” websites like Atrios, but I personally would very much like to see a more dynamic commenting space for Ozblogistan readers, and LP seems to be the best option right now.
Sign of a healthy, vibrant democracy and all that…
.. and just to practice what I preach a bit more, here is a story that will certainly be of interest to Mark and others watching the LP bottom line: Google says it has a “moral imperative” to “help” the newspaper industry. How are they going to do this? By kindly letting the newspapers use their double-click advertising!
Kim, I had a bit of a look at your excursion into Troppo-land.
I think the distinction between policy and process is problematic. First of all I don’t think you and Mark address process and not policy, even defined in their terms.
But policy also deals with process. It is policy for schools to get their returns in by a certain date, and there are policies that relate to how failure to do so should be viewed. This operates in the political sphere as well. Ask Florida and the other state (it’s slipped my mind) about process in relation the the Democratic Party primaries.
Also there seems to be an assumption (I could be wrong about this) that policy is more important than process. Process is the difference between having democracy or not, so I wouldn’t downgrade it.
Sociologists are in large part about uncovering hidden realities, of turning the searchlight on taken-for-granted assumptions, beliefs, values, knowledge, ways of seeing the world. As such processes, power relationships, structures as well as overt policy positions by those who are in a position to make them (which is rightfully subject to question) are bread and butter.
Anyone who thinks sociology is boring is barely alive.
I along with Robert Merkel seem to get the tick of approval. I’ve probably buggered that now.
Here’s an idea that is perhaps over-due on LP: the occasional OPEN THREAD.
I notice Possum is inviting commentators to get involved in a “guest/URL post” section. What about it, Mark?
I think Mark’s a bit pre-occupied with having to finish his thesis by Monday, Gandhi, but I’ll pass the suggestion on!
Ok, here you go:
http://larvatusprodeo.net/2008/06/12/lp-virtual-soapbox/
gandhi: “and yet so many of the comments come from the same people (often pushing the same tired arguments)…”
[Meditates quietly on the nature of irony, a force which would appear to drive the universe every bit as much as gravity and electromagnetism]
jpz, wot u sayin’ mate? LOL
FWIW, I think LP has matured, and matured well, through recent memory. While I only check out a number of blogs you can count on one hand, it’s quite clear that such positive maturation is not necessarily an easy thing for a group blog to achieve.
Fair to make a call on it, I think LP has maintained a welcome level of transparency, as well. While I don’t check it out that much, this could also be said of Catallaxy from my limited experience. I’m talking here in terms of content and what comes through between the lines, or in the vibe, as the reason for the content. In the current climate, these two main group blogs exhibit a particular honesty in this regard, which stands out and should be applauded. You don’t feel you’re getting content designed to generate readership-for-revenue.
Mark as the blog owner has been open to readers in relation to monetising the blog - the reasons for that, where the money goes, and how much - which is something Webdiary set out to do with a passion as respect for its readers - and readers cannot but respect that, after the “behind closed doors” backroom agendas (particularly of MSM) creating that underskin irk when the content published gave it away, either obviously or in vibe or elsewhere in its publication as another true and distinctly unpleasant ‘personality’ of it made it onto the page.
I think LP’s a bit long-winded at times in this busy world, and it often skews its writing into its community - but again that achievement of community is not a given for a group blog - and LP is fairly entitled to enjoy in that achievement. As a reader, this is not unpleasant, as the sense of warmth for those contributors involved compensates for the experience of reading what can be a lot of pap. Better for reader(s) to suffer pap from a blog exhibiting often a warm heart and that heart not frightened of showing itself, than to fall into the trap of enjoying a trainwreck brought upon by an unhealthy love of cold cynicism or hidden self-aggrandizement, and leave it feeling worse for visiting.
At least when LP blows its own trumpet it does so openly.
Credit where it’s due, and it’s a pleasure to throw two bobs of it on the table. Good on you, Mark in heading it up, for what you’ve achieved. Those are bloody good stats, and for what it’s worth, I think you’re setting standards in areas which are to be applauded: in transparency, fair-dinkumness and grace.
(Again, I don’t read that many blogs, so I hope others who’ve achieved for themselves the same are not offended. - That said, too, I think the new SL & LE are going to work wonders).
gandhi — apologies, O Great Soul.
Sorry, it’s just a character flaw of mine, I can never resist the easy ones.
Back into the bin me with me now, to have a nice chat with Oscar the Grouch…
Robert [58];
Agree.
Though some of us contributors/ detractors/ opinionated so-&-sos/ concerned scribblers/ whatever do tend to ramble on a bit. [Brevity? How do you spell that?] Most people I’ve come across here are pretty straightforward - even if they are tearing you and your opinions up for confetti. I like Larvatus Prodeo because it informs me, it challenges my assumptions and its good [usually] clean fun too.
j-p-z [59]:
Hey, family-size packets of Irony are only $2.99 at Walmart this week.
And say Hi to Oscar for me too please. L=O=L