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Guido Fawkes airbrushed out of the present by Tory pamphlet

*Amended*

Conservative aAgitator and uber-blogger Guido Fawkes has called out a Telegraph leader writer for airbrushing him out of the stats in a pamphlet on politics and the web.

"Politics, Policy and the Internet" was written by Robert Colville and published by the Centre for Policy Studies and includes a chart based on Hitwise data for the "Market Share of Websites of Leading Blogs":

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But why would they leave out a star right-wing blogista from such a study. Guido suspects the Telegraph may be ashamed of his success. Guido makes a shocking accusation:

To come second to one not-always-sober Guy with a lap-top after losing £10 million on developing your website last year?

Surely not?

According to Guido, Colville says he fully intended to include order-order.com, the "website of the leading blog" of Mr Fawkes.

: : "Politics, Policy and the Internet" is worth a read in its own right, BTW – if you like that sort of thing.

: : : Reminds me of some grumbles I heard in meejah-land about the Telegraph using Hitwise data to declare itself the best read newspaper website in the UK. But that was may have been just down to sour-grapes on the part of A.N.Other national newspaper’s team and not a complex point about a demographic bias in Hitwise’s data-set.

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Antony Mayfield

6 responses to “Guido Fawkes airbrushed out of the present by Tory pamphlet”

  1. Guido Fawkes Avatar
    Guido Fawkes

    Tsk tsk, not a Conservative.

    Am happy to accept it was a cock-up, Colvile is fair to Guido in the text.

  2. Simon Dickson Avatar
    Simon Dickson

    The Telegraph spent £10m in a year… and the development company (Interesource) still went under? That would be extraordinary if true.

    I must admit, the lack of Guido figures was instantly obvious. Seems a totally daft thing to try and get away with.

  3. Antony Mayfield Avatar
    Antony Mayfield

    Not a Conservative? Not even a bit? A little bit?

    A little bit, hey?

    OK – fair enough…

  4. Robert Colvile Avatar
    Robert Colvile

    Simon – wasn’t trying to ‘get away with’ anything. On the figures I got, Order-Order was included; when the CPS replotted the chart, they left it out for reasons best known to themselves (have emailed the original chart to Guido, and am happy to do the same if you want). Since it wasn’t meant to be a definitive chart, but an indication of approximate traffic share, I didn’t push them on the issue, which was probably a mistake (also, that line represents all the Telegraph’s blogs, not just its politics stuff, so shouldn’t be used in isolation).

    Thanks for your review on Puffbox, btw – read it with interest.

  5. One Man and His Blog Avatar
    One Man and His Blog

    links for 2008-02-20

    Valleywag finds its voice Interesting look at the strengths and weaknesses of Valleywag in the light of its huge surge is traffic. Much to learn here. (tags: valleywag gawker blogs blogging publishing journalism onlinepublishing) Guido Fawkes airbrush…

  6. Mark Hanson Avatar
    Mark Hanson

    The report is probably the best summary I’ve seen of the benefits of politicians actually engaging with the public online and how that might be done….and it also makes the point that UK politicians are failing in this spectacularly.

    TV has ruined proper political engagement and the internet might rescue it, once mainstream politicians grasp the old skills of politics i.e. talking to voters and activists, letting them talk back etc. It sounds simple but I’ve been in the pitches over the last two years and it’s actually very revolutionary.

    There is hope though, and one of the best elected politicians at putting this stuff into practice is a Lib Dem – Steve Webb, who’s discussed in the report.

    We at LabourHome, the largest independent Labour blog are trying to play our part in a small way and trying to engage the grassroots to support a campaign for an outsider, human rights barrister Mark McDonald, to challenge for the position of Labour party treasurer.

    http://news.sky.com/skynews/article/0,,91211-1303826,00.html

    PS Guido is right to be miffed at not getting sufficient credit and he’s not a Tory. He just has lots and lots and lots of friends at Tory HQ:)

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