Jim Hoeft and Brian Kirwin over at Bearing Drift shared their thoughts last week about the relevance of political blogging in this year’s General Assembly elections.  While their points about the state of the blogosphere are true (not for lack of trying, competition, partisanship and vitriol creating a turn-off), I think trying to compare the impact of blogs in 2007 to their impact in 2006 is like comparing apples to oranges.

Vivian Paige hits the big difference:

In 2006, we had a single Senate race, and while all 11 Congressional seats were up for re-election, only 2 or 3 were competitive. As the result, most of the blogs were much more focused on just a few races, plus the Marshall-Newman amendment. (Heck, even the national blogs and MSM were focusing on Virginia towards the end.) That concentration made the blogosphere much more powerful as a medium for getting information out.

In 2006 blogs were able to concentrate on a handful of races and, given the presence of a statewide race, every blog was relevant as every locality was at stake.  In 2007 blogs were only as relevant as the races in their area.  As a Richmond blogger, I didn’t have much to say about Richmond races because they weren’t nearly as competitive (if there was any competition at all).  Yet, while I may have had something to say about races in Northern Virginia, my blog isn’t as relevant as, say, Black Velvet Bruce Li may be to someone in Fairfax.

The ability of blogs to make widespread impacts was limited because the politics this time around was local.  Yes, there were some statewide implications of the overall results, but the blogs are at their best when they’re able to appeal to their audience, which is a lot more local than folks might think.

2008 and 2009 will be the years that will truly test the Virginia blogosphere.  With a Senate race next year we’ll see how well blogs can capitalize off of their impact in 2006.  We’ll get our first taste of the ability of the blogosphere to impact the Presidential race and whether that impact will come from Virginia-centric bloggers or the national bloggers who reside in Virginia.  2009 will be the true test of the blogosphere’s longevity as it comes full circle with the Governor’s race.  A lot can happen in the blogosphere in two years, just as the last two years have shown.  I don’t think blogs can be written off quite yet, but it’ll be interesting to see what they can really do when put to the test.

Douglas McGill has been teaching a basic journalism community education classes in Minneapolis for three years.  He’s ended up learning a few things himself :

1. Citizens are an untapped source of expertise and positive civic energy that journalists can help unlock.

2. There is no substitute for a strong, independent, institutional journalism.

3. Citizens can help journalists reconnect to the wellsprings of their craft.

4. Journalists need to learn citizenship skills, as much as citizens need to learn journalism.

5. A good citizen journalism class, like a great newspaper, allows for all types of expression – artistic, poetic, literary, photographic, musical, comical and fun.

6. Citizens create vital community consciousness through the discipline of writing journalistically.

7. I’m the one who needs to change.

He goes into more detail with each point at the link.

Embark’s new Facebook application College Planner lets you research colleges and apply to them without ever having to leave Facebook.  From CNet News:

Online applications, I suppose, have been thoroughly destigmatized (back in my day, there was still the concern that an electronic application wouldn’t be taken as seriously as a paper one), but it’s still a bit ironic to be applying to college through a site that’s best known as an addictive procrastination hub.

What really stands out about “social college applications” is that many people I knew (not all, obviously) were fiercely private about where they were applying, especially if the school was a “reach.” Then again, this was before high schoolers were eagerly exposing their souls on MySpace.com profiles, so perhaps privacy is no longer sacred.

AllFaceBook, CNet’s source, has a follow up post about making sure your profile is ready to be snooped at by colleges.  Folks in the workforce have known (or should have known) to do this for years, as more and more employers are turning to Google to help with background checks of prospective applicants.  It wouldn’t be too much of a stretch to expect colleges to start doing the same, finding prospective students’ MySpace and Facebook pages for whatever info they may want to judge a potential student by.