I am glad to see that a post I wrote, Candidates' Blogs: Glorified Public Relations? has received some good discussion in the comments section at techPresident as well as some other blogs. On MYDD user Psericks wrote a critique of my post that is generating even more discussion. So I thought it would be good to follow-up on that critique and further explore the issue.

Did you read the blog post on the candidate Web site where the blogger gushed over the candidate and outlined the talking points of the campaign? So did I, over and over and over again. I have to be honest, I follow a lot of blogs but I almost never read the blog sections of the candidate’s sites. I cannot imagine most of you do either.

As candidates cede authority over their web presence to supporters, allowing the posting of voter-generated content to campaign sites, there are bound to be some interesting and unexpected consequences. I decided to explore the presence of voter-generated content on candidate sites and its effect on the site's rank. The results I found are presented below.

Note: Candidates that allow significant voter-generated presence on their sites are bolded.

Salon has a very interesting article today by Lindsay Beyerstein of Majikthise on why she turned down the job that Amanda Marcotte briefly held with the Edwards campaign. She also addresses what she thinks is a major flaw in their online strategy: by making bloggers "official" you remove most of the value of their independent, outsider voices.

John Edwards' blogger Amanda Marcotte has left his campaign staff, effective yesterday. The great deal of negative attention paid to her by the Catholic League's Bill Donohue, she says, made it impossible for her to keep serving her candidate effectively.