Saturday, January 17, 2009

Draper gets copied and Irelanded

Harold Wilson famously said that "a week is a long time in politics" and if the cliche is true for politics its also true for the political blogosphere I guess. In less than a week, Derek Draper has managed to set up a website that had the potential to be something quite good (not very pretty design excluded) which has then turned into a transparent centralised Labour project that doesn't credit its contributers.

What's more, Draper has proved that he's little more than an egotistical "don't you know who I am" type which has then resulted in his entire content being reproduced on a much nicer looking site without the "nazi admin" tendency called Labourist.

It is a rare moment when I decide to link to Tim Ireland but he has had a rather interesting email conversation with Derek Draper about some of the issues surrounding the site's comment policy which I too posted about the other day.

Incidnetally, should anyone be wondering what my comment policy is here, it is whatever I decide at the time. Largely this means that everything goes through unless I think it might be libellous or its spam. Very occassionally I might reject a comment when I can't be arsed anymore or you're a Zionist conspiracy theorist.

Note: The link to Labour List is being changed to Labourist instead.

12 comments:

Conand said...

I'm a Zionist conspiracy theorist testing the consistency of Dizzy's comment policy.

Derek Draper said...

Boy, the British blogosphere! What an introduction I have had. Never have I experienced such a self-important, self-regarding, self-obsessed group in my life. No wonder the British Blogosphere is such a tiny, tiny, tiny ghetto. Don't any of you realise that I don't care what you think? Why would I? Why should I? LabourList is designed (wait for it) for real people. We are aiming at hundreds of thousands of Labour-minded people who want to partake of politics online, almost all of them for the first time. You all think I am trying to join your little band but I am not - who would want to? Why? You totally conflate the idea of being part of a sub group with using a particular medium, in a particular way, to leap over that group to the wider world. We have been going ONE week, our traffic far exceeds our expectations. We are only a beta site, our marketing, advertising and PR has barely rolled out, much of what we are doing - content, moderation etc. is experimental so that we have ironed out all sorts of issues before we launch on the 12th February to an entire country of potential readers. People who aren't "bloggers", don't know what "wordpress" is, do not know and will never, ever know who Tom Ireland or Dizzy or any of you are. I am aiming for the mass market where, to all intents and purposes you all don't exist. While you are all poring over what I am doing because it is 100 times more interesting than any of your own ultra-minority antics, I will be building an online community of Labour-minded people - thousands of them. When that has been achieved - and we have hit every stage and target we have set ourselves thus far - you are all going to look very silly. But no-one apart from us will ever know. So, please, do keep blogging about me and Labourlist. The saddest, no, I mean, really, really sad thing is, - and this is the fundamental lesson I have learnt in these short seven days - you really seem to have got nothing better to do. I'm sorry guys, but its pathetic.

Anonymous said...

Not sure your comment about Nazi admin is justified. The comments on labourList are vitriolic, almost without exception.

Which is good to see. They're overdue for a kicking.

Lets see how long they last.

J.

Tim said...

Another revealing comment from Derek Draper, that shows (again) that he knows little and cares even less.

Please enter my tiny ghetto at your whim, Master Draper. I know that, not being a real person and all, I don't even deserve the courtesy of direct eye contact or a correct name, much less a polite answer to a valid question.

[Psst! Not every visit is a vote for you. There is a such a thing as negative attention, and it's not the same as positive attention. Some grown-ups (example: Donal 'hahaha you linked to me' Blaney) struggle to understand this, but surely it's something you're at least aware of given your foray into child psychotherapy. There's so much more, but the rest of this gift of a comment I'll leave to its intended recipient. We don't get on by the way, but you may have noticed that in all those invasion-theme movies, even the Merkins and the Russkies play nice when hostile aliens turn up wanting something or other from our puny planet.]

Praguetory said...

I've decided to link to Labourist too. Compared to similar sites it has the benefit of light moderation and an unintrusive registration process.

Null said...

"you are all going to look very silly."

Twat.

WV: draperiatwat

Anonymous said...

Labourist light moderation?

My comment pointing out that their Whois details were false, in contravention of ICANN rules, was not only subject to moderation, but also resulted in an IP ban from even reading their website....

Angry Steve said...

Re: Anon, 18-Jan-2009 15:34:00.

You should report them to Icann then...

http://wdprs.internic.net/

Anonymous said...

Mmnnnn... I started a blog in response to the one-party, Stalinist state that is the Labour run London Borough of Newham; the directly elected Mayor (Sir Robin Wales) is the most egotistic arsehole I have ever met (I was a Labour councillor - crossed the floor to the Tories).

Not bothered with the blog for a good while now as most people in Newham don't seem to give a fuck. However, Drooper has inspired me to soldier on in my own insignificant way. Thanks for the inspiration Del!

Anonymous said...

Perhaps when Dolly's Mrs isn't "entertaining" her male friends, she could moderate his comments in the vain hope of preventing his self humiliation?

No? Thought not...

Anonymous said...

Derek Draper's comments are just dripping with self-importance and nothing but comtempt for their supposedly-target audience. It's the most honest PR I've ever seen from a New Labour lackey!

Oh, and BTW I'm an anti-Zionist conspiracy theorist. Am I welcome here? ;)

Carl Eve said...

Oh Derek, you are so out of your depth here.

The current blogosphere IS your audience. These bloggers - not least Ireland, Unity and Libconspiracy but even Dizzy, Iain and Staines - already have the audience. It is these bloggers you should be learning from, not sneering at. If they have advice, you should listen and probably take it on board because - newsflash - they've been doing it successfully for years and know what they're doing.
You, on the other hand, don't. And yet still you're lording it up.

Palast was right in his description of you.

Carl Eve