Seattle-area readers may already know about the P-I’s relatively new blog offerings: seattlepi.com Microsoft Blog is written by Todd Bishop (who appeared on KUOW’s new biz show, Wi-fi Networking News writer Glenn Fleishmann.
Sometimes I find Bishops’ blog a bit dry and newsy, but he seems to be finding his blog-legs as in this post providing some context for a recent story about Wiki inventor Ward Cunningham coming aboard the mothership, or when he posts background and links for today’s examination of recently-published Microsoft marketing touting a lower total cost of ownership for Windows than Linux.
the P-I’s senior online producer, Brian Chin, also blogs in Buzzworthy, a wider-net variety of blog. Today he’s linked to a story about the Creativity Machine, a study about the problem of obesity in an affluent society, and a P-I feature by traveling correspondent Winda Benedetti (I believe Chin’s ex-colleague, now taking a trip around the world with her husband, as I recall) on the mystery of international toilets.
There is also a blog on the Mariners and consumer news, neither of which I’m currently familiar enough with to talk about.
Both of the blogs I cite in detail have open comments on entries, only infrequently garnering input, and neither posts trackbacks. I’m pretty sure they are using Movable Type. I’d like it if they would expose trackbacks but I can imagine there might be some infighting about outbound links at the paper.
One of the interesting things about the comments that do appear (troll-fests aside) is that they reflect the demographics of the P-I’s online readership, and therefore tend to reflect a distinct sensibility from comment threads seen in the rest of the blogosphere. I hesitate to characterize that sensibility (I haven’t seen enough of the comments to really be able to pin it down). I do look forward to watching that sensibility evolve to reflect the immediacy and bidirectional nature of the medium.