Both major U.S. political parties have said they will let bloggers cover their national conventions from the inside.
The Democratic National Committee had said in June they would let a select group of bloggers in with media credentials – a reported 60 have already applied – and the Republican National Committee has subsequently said they, too, would give some bloggers their passes.
"We want to treat them just the same as other reporters," Democratic National Convention online communications director Mike Liddell told the Washington Post July 6. "We're even planning to do a breakfast for them the first day of the convention."
This year's conventions will be the first that bloggers are allowed to cover on site. The Post said that could mean "a clash of two very different cultures" – the freewheeling bloggers versus the carefully-staged convention productions, especially with the bloggers perceived as being bound to nothing much outside of writing what they think and feel in hand with reporting facts, and having no formal obligation, the paper noted, to be fair or accurate.
In fact, the former campaign manager for Howard Dean – whose own official blog had a big hand in propelling him to the top of the Democratic presidential ranks, until Kerry overtook him earlier this year – told the Post letting the bloggers into the Democratic convention this time around could present risks, especially if Kerry tries to present himself as a centrist against many of the pro-Democratic bloggers being more liberal.
"They're much tougher, I think, from an ideological bent than mainstream press," Joe Trippi told the Post. "You're not going to take any flak from the mainstream press for tacking to the center on a given issue."
Republican-inclined bloggers are thought likewise to be harder-line conservatives than President Bush, and they, too, could prove problematic if they decide to rip Bush for any perceived softening-up at the convention.
Talk about politics' version of the New York Yankees versus the Boston Red Sox: the Democrats round up in Boston July 26, while the GOP rounds up in New York August 30.
The parties aren't exactly immune to other cyberspace phenomena, either. As July began, the Republicans nailed a deal with Nextel to provide wireless service for the convention at Madison Square Garden. This includes wireless phones with Nextel's Direct Connect long-range digital walkie-talkie feature; Direct Connect wireless Internet and e-mail; and wireless modem cards allowing direct ties to the Net or dialup access through phone lines.
Nextel will also prove on-site services and wireless coverage for GOP delegates, the press, and others at the convention, the company said.
