June 06, 2005

Sam Adams' Imminent Blogosphere Debut

Will Other Local Officials Follow Suit?

Prior to his office telling "the whole world" about it, we've gotten a look at the long-awaited blog from Commissioner Sam Adams.

News of Adams' intention to join the local blogosphere first broke back in December, and in February we pointed to a sort of proto-blog Adams was writing about his mission to visit 100 businesses in his first 100 days in office. Then in March, we tried to nudge local officials, with a brief look at what was happening in other parts of the country.

We're uncertain of the specific timeframe, but it's clear that the much-promised Adams blog is pretty much ready to go, and indeed it appears to function as a proper blog.

While it's too early to know whether Adams and his staff -- yes, members of his staff are listed as authors on the site -- will earnestly blog or merely take turns posting the equivalent of press releases, the site's usage of TypePad means that the expected features of a blog appear to be in place.

• Comment functionality exists, although the post button is labelled "Send Comment to Author". It's unclear at the moment whether this means comments will not be public at all or if they are being moderated before being approved for publication.
• Trackback data for posts is being published, but it's not apparent whether or not trackbacks will be published to entries when pings are sent to them.
• There is a properly-functioning RSS feed, so for those who read their blogs through aggregators (or simply use them as a "new content" notification system), that feature appears good to go, at least based upon our subscribing to the feed in our own RSS aggregator.
• Posts are archived by category, date, and author.
• Sidebars provide easy access to recent posts as well as the requisite list of Adams' initiatives, speeches, and testimony. There's also a currently-unpopulated space for "Community Links".

To some extent, the Adams' blog by default will set the standard for the presence of local officials in Portland's blogosphere, given the relative lack of such activity (the only real other such activity being Commission Randy Leonard's status as a contributor to BlueOregon). That said, what we've gotten to see of the Adams blog suggests that they haven't taken on the task in a half-assed way, and actually will be setting a real benchmark for other local officials to meet.

Or, rather, it has the potential to do so. It remains to be seen just how reader comments will be handled, and if they will be published to the site at all. It also remains to be seen how natural Adams and his staff will be as bloggers.

But given the dismal lack of real blogging activity by local officials (although we've heard there's another such blog in the works), this first real stab at it could have ended up trying for a lot less than it seems to be.

The other test of its success or failure? Whether or not it prompts other local officials to follow the respective leads of Commissioners Leonard and Adams.

Posted at 06:34 PM | PermalinkComments (8) | TrackBacks (0)
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