Blogs and the US Presidential election

One view of the US presidential election was that "One blogger is worth ten votes - a voter with a weblog is ten times more powerful than a voter without a weblog, because there's more voting than just going in and flipping a lever." Dave Winer, Harvard University

However, it turns out that higher voter participation in the election was inversely related to the degree of Internet usage, or as the Register puts it, "How organized religion, not net religion, won it for Bush":

"Technophobes and luddites won the election for George W Bush in 2004, not technology-toting bloggers, by turning out the vote. The giant, self-congratulatory humpfest that is the blogger nation really didn't do much at all for the Democrats, despite Joe Trippi telling anyone who'll listen that the internet transformed politics. For voter turn-out was markedly higher in the states with the lowest broadband penetration.

Hawaii, Massachusetts, New Jersey, Connecticut, New York and California have the highest broadband penetration and all went to Kerry. Meanwhile, Mississippi, South Dakota, Montana, Wyoming and New Mexico have the lowest penetration and all went to Bush. But the rise in votes was proportionately higher in states where the internet doesn't reach so many people."

phishing attacks soar

See BBC News "Cyber criminals step up the pace " 6/12/04

"So-called phishing attacks that try to trick people into handing over confidential details have boomed in 2004, say security experts. The number of phishing e-mail messages stopped by security firm MessageLabs has risen more than tenfold in less than 12 months. In 2004 it detected more than 18 million phishing e-mail messages.

Other statistics show that in 2004 73% of all e-mail was spam and one in 16 messages were infected with a virus."

Microsoft get into Blogging

From BBC news, technology section:

"Software giant Microsoft is taking the plunge into the world of blogging. It is launching a test service to allow people to publish blogs, or online journals, called MSN Spaces"

It actually looks quite good, so worth considering if you are thinking of ever starting up a blog. Click here to access MSN Spaces

Why 2004 was the year of the blog

From BBC News , 1st Dec 2004:

"The term "blog" has been chosen as the top word of 2004 by a US dictionary publisher.
Merriam-Webster said "blog" headed the list of most looked-up terms on its site during the last twelve months. During 2004 blogs, or web logs, have become hugely popular and some have started to influence mainstream media. Other words on the Merriam-Webster list were associated with major news events such as the US presidential election or natural disasters that hit the US. "

..and to think at the beginning of this course almost none of you had ever heard of a blog!