Once more with feeling
Yesterday while I was busy cleaning up later watch fights between big robots (in disguise), NiT was placed in suspended animation. I guess it’s going to turn into something else? No one knows. What we do know is that the community is not content to let WKRN set their agenda for them and with that in mind a group of local bloggers has created Music City Bloggers to fill the void and hopefully address some of the shortcomings at NiT. These same bloggers were also kind enough to ask for my input on a possible companion site and/or local aggregator.
You my recall that some time ago I put together a digg clone for local bloggers called losobo. That experiment never really got off the ground for a couple of reasons, but I thought, and so did others, that the general idea was valid. So I’ve site up yet another site called TN Blog Watch. It is also based on the same software, but I’ve restructured that categories and added automatic RSS importing so it won’t have to rely completely on manual input. It can also form the basis for local RSS aggregation if it does nothing else.
Of course if TN Blog Watch ends up as a nothing more than a glorified aggregator, I’ll be a little disappointed. The idea is for TN Blog Watch and Music City Bloggers to form a symbiotic relationship. TN Blog Watch will gather posts and the editors and could use the Live page to take the pulse of the community by watching what is being voted and commented on. It’s also hoped that the live page or the Upcoming page could live in a sidebar over at Music City Bloggers.
Like any site, TN Blog Watch is useless without people. To reach its true potential, it needs people to vote for and discuss those posts that are really interesting. I’m also really excited that TN Blog Watch includes community comment moderation. If you are a regular from NiT, you may recall one post in particular where trolls got out of hand, but there was no way to moderate some of the very nasty comments. That won’t happen here.
If you need a little more info, please take a look at the TN Blog Watch about page. I look forward to seeing everyone there.
One other little note: If you would like to add your Tennessee blog to the list of those being watched, please send email to admin at tnblogwatch dot com and ask to be added to the RSS feed importer.