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28 July 2003: "Roll call redux"

As regular readers will have noticed, I've modified the blogroll. For starters, I've dispensed with the "mini-banners" format, for at least two reasons, the first being that I was putting off up links until I got round to making a graphic. The second was that the sidebar was getting longer than many of the entries.

As you can see, I've pruned a bit, and added a lot more.

My policy is crystallising to some extent. For starters, I no longer bother with blogs which are written by people who already have a career in the established media, be it as a journalist or a pundit (the Reynoldses and Sullivans of this world). For me, the appeal of Blogoslavia lies in being able to discover opinions which I wouldn't normally be able to find elsewhere; if I want to know how an opinion columnist feels about an issue, I'll find it on the op-ed (web)page of any newspaper which publishes that person's column, thank you.

I'm happy to link to blogs by people whose political viewpoints I don't share, provided I feel I'm getting something out of it, ideally a different perspective which causes me to rethink my previously held opinion. That description does not extend to material which relies mainly on abuse and/or hyperbole to get its message across. Examples of this on the right wing would be EU flags adorned with a swastika or a picture of Stalin (Samizdata.net), dismissing all Palestinians as "savages" (Little Green Footballs), or describing the Sec-Gen of the UN as a "worthless piece of wildebeest shit" (Anti-Idiotarian Rottweiler); on the left, off-hand references to George W. Bush as "Monkey Boy," American foreign policy as "imperialist" or "genocidal," or the use of the term "neoconservative" in a pejorative sense, especially accompanied by evidence that the author doesn't actually know what a neocon is. I think you get the idea.

I've been in correspondence with David "Europundit" Weman, and become aware of a clutch of blogs via him. These include Pedantry, written by Scott Marten, a Canadian living and working in Brussels; Almost a Diary by Tobias Schwarz, a German guy, originally from Mainz, I believe; Iain "Mr. Happy" Coleman, who is a "magnetosphere-ionosphere coupling scientist" (I have only the vaguest inkling of waht that means), teaches at the Open University and is also on the Cambridge (the one in England, that is) city council for the Lib Dems. I haven't really had a good look at Matthew Turner and Nick Barlow yet, but they come pretty highly recommended.

You've undoubtedly heard of "superblog" Crooked Timber by now. A collection very intelligent people, with some interesting insights. Thought-provoking, even if you don't agree with everything that's written. Since the Farrells are keeping Gallowglass on as a sideline, I'm keeping up the link.

I'd been getting some hits from normblog, even while it was still under development. As it turns out, its author, Norman Geras, is a professor at the University of Manchester's Department of Government; in fact, he's worked there in various capacities since before I was born. Harry Hatchet reckons normblog is a "must-read"; I'll take his word for it, and I'm more than a little chuffed to be on the blogroll.

Eurosavant is written by a guy under the pseudonym "MAO." "MAO" is an American living in Amsterdam, my birthplace; he speaks French, Dutch and German (and maybe a few others), and his stock in trade is producing round-ups of European online media in those languages. If you're interested in what "the" French or Germans are actually saying, rather than relying solely on what their governments are saying, this is a must-read. It's actually quite informative even for people who speak the languages in question. For example, I would probably never look at the Dutch Reformatorisch Dagblad—which, as the name suggests, is a heavily Calvinist newspaper; so much so that the site is not accessible on Sundays—preferring to check out the NRC or the Volkskrant instead).

Mr. McGillicuddy works as a substitute teacher in the eastern (San Francisco) Bay Area. He provides a look into the mind of an educator, which is well worth a read. I was surprised to see that his grandmother is from a small town in Iowa (Council Bluffs) which is one town over from where my mother-in-law comes from (and both his grandmother and my mother-in-law now live in the Bay Area).

Okay, I guess that about covers it for moment.

au currant
Black Decaf
The Illiterati
Cointelpro Tool
Norman Geras
A Fistful of Euros
Harry's Place
Plastic Gangster
Blogfonte
Tim Newman
€urosavant
Crooked Timber
Gallowglass
Mr. McGillicuddy
eameljenet
Civax
101-280
Colby Cosh
Peaktalk
Mick Hartley
Oliver Kamm

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