Diary: On Reaching Top Article Status on DKOS, and Accused of Being a Sexist and a Fascist

Yesterday, I received an email from a reader, notifying me that the article I'd written and posted on Christmas morning, Pelosi and Conyers-- Smarter than Impeachment, had become the subject of the second most popular thread on Democraticunderground.com (DU).

That inspired me to submit the article to digg.com, netscape.com and dailykos. For the first two, you just submit a link, using the icons at the bottom of the article. If enough people click on the article vote or digg buttons, the article rises to the top of the topic page, and if it gets even more diggs or votes, it goes to the front page. If you go to other media and blog sites, many now have these icons, even the NY Times and Washington Post. But we had them before any other blog site or mainstream media site I know of. (not the very first, but very very early adopter.) To vote on articles, you must be signed up. It's worth it. Once you are signed up, you can support your favorite writers and articles and sites by submitting or voting on article links. A front page link on netscape or digg can mean thousands, even tens of thousands more readers for an article.

Here are the links for the digg.com and netscape.com links for the story, if you feel like helping promote the story, you can click on these links. You'll need to be signed up (free) for digg.com and netscape.com.

To Promote this article on Digg.com click here.

To Promote this article on Netscape, Click here.

But the big news is, the article was "recommended" by enought people at Dailykos.com to become the top story on the site, from 5:00 PM EST, until I went to bed, past midnight. And it was still up in the top ten listing, 19 hours and 441 comments later. Here's the article on Dailykos

Here on OpEdNews.com, the article has garnered over 61 comments, a record for the site and a good sign that we'll be seeing more comments on all articles. But there was also a lot of disagreement. There are plenty of people, which is why I wrote the article, who are really angry at Pelosi and company for taking impeachment off the table. They said that democraticunderground and dailykos are really dens of democrats, not progressives, and it was no surprise they liked my article. One accused me of being a new age Rupert Murdoch-like shill trying to make money in the media biz. HAH. Then why do I put in 70-100 hour weeks and earn a lot less than I did before I started this project? But that's another conversation I'm actually going to address a bit later.

First, I want to explore the possibilities of reaching the top story of DKOS. Since people like Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi, John Kerry and other congressional leaders actually read Dailykos, getting to be the top story on Kos probably means someone on John Conyers' staff, and Harry Reid's and Nancy Pelosi's read it too. I think that's a good thing. If they read it and saw the comments-- all the people who want this to happen-- that's a good thing. If they saw it, and saw that it came from OpEdNews, that's a good thing too. One of my long term goals is to grow OpEdNews so it CAN make a difference and that means that articles we publish will reach people in power, decision-makers. Remember, this all started, once I posted the article, because a READER posted it to DU.

Time magazine was right. YOU are the people who can make a difference. I've become more and more convinced and enthusiastic in first believing and then empowering that. One thing YOU have an opportunity to do that could make a difference is to click on those links above, to Digg and netscape.

Getting Bashed on My Own Website

One regular commenter has called me a sexist and fascist in the same comment, and has suggested that I'm just a Rupert Murdoch Like new age media wannabe. I say he is full of sh*t.

Still, it hurts to be sh*t on by someone who feels he can judge me and the site, someone who characterizes himself in his bio as anticivilization. I assume his unexplained comment about me being sexist refers to a link I did over the weekend, to a site that showed the actual pictures which led to the Miss Nevada to be dethroned. I actually asked, in the link, what people thought of including this kind of news on the site, because I believe in democratizing the site, allowing readers to play a major role in influencing what the site publishes and features. I"d like more people to respond to that link and the comment conversation that follows. Have I done something horrible? Should OpEdNews cover this kind of news, like CNN and the rest of the mainstream media do? While we're at it, should OpEdNews cover non-political news?

Perhaps my critic thinks I should read the minds of readers to find out what they want or support. Then I could limit my posting to what I think they want. Of course, there is no pleasing all the readers all the time.

With 400,000+ unique visitors a month, I've been fortunate to not have much of a problem with nasty people.

When it comes to the contents of the website, my philosophy, since starting the site as a place to just get my opinion on line, was to build a site that, like a newspaper, covers all different aspects of life-- news, op-ed, sports, arts, science, business, living, design, etc. After all, even progressives have homes, eat food, take vacations, read books, etc.

Now some people think that a progressive site should only cover politics. That' s total BS to me. Some say a progressive media site should only do articles, not blogs. I say BS. I've spent my life feeling like I've been wielding a machete, cutting new trails where others had not gone, where there were no standard markets and usual ways of doing things. Maybe that's why OpEdNews is not just a news site, not just a blog site and has been rejected by some blog service sites as not being bloggish enough.

Now the thing that really ticks me off is being called a fascist, presumably because the commentercalls me a sexist, because I, with guarded doubts, that I raised, and asked the community to comment on, did the link I mentioned to the Nevada Beauty queen's picture. He shifts from calling me sexist to fascist.

He's not the first. Some people whose articles have been rejected call me a censor, which one might morph to fascist. Some people may not even be happy with the links we reject. I say we, because OpEdNews has a group of editors who work the article and links submissions queue.

OpEdNews also has an advisory board which I tap periodically for advice and counsel. More on that will be announced later. Suffice it to say that the people on the board are respected progressives. Well, there are some nutcases who will bash anyone. But overall, they are highly respected.

To my commenter who calls me a fascist-- you are way off base. Frankly, this is MY site, and my responsibility. I'm the one who gets the emails from the lawyers. I'm the one who pays the bills when funding comes up short. And I'm the one who protects the community from angry, toxic people. There are a lot of angry people on this site and they have good reasons.I sometimes publish angry articles by angry people, because I believe they are cathartic. But sometimes the anger overflows to inappropriate areas. I'm going to take your comments here in that light. But clean up your act. I have a responsibility here to progressive values, to free speech, to the community, to growth of the website, to economic and legal stability and viability of the website. It's a balance. I hope you will temper your comments so they fit in. keep them honest, non-nasty, fact-based, truthful and non-toxic and you'll do well.

In the past, I've learned-- the hard way-- that it is best, when saying something nasty, to save it for a day before clicking on the send or submit key.

Last but not least, My Humorous, but serious Call for Funding
Now, you would be surprised, by this point, if there was a call for funding. Sometimes I tell you what wonderful things OpEdNews is doing. Today, you've seen some of the abuse I have to put up with. So, what do you think? Is today the day you liberate a few bucks, of $50 or $500 for a contribution? Donate Here

Thanks,

Rob Kall
I encourage you to add your opinions on the Miss Nevada link and on whether I'm a fascist, sexist, etc., and whether I shoudl try out new content and ask opinions or not. Comment here, or on the other pages.