Over the last couple of months I’ve been advertising for someone to take over the running of Lib Dem Voice, as unfortunately I’m unable to continue for various reasons – not least of which the amount of time running a site of this nature takes up (Iain Dale may well pop up now and tell me he warned me… and he did!).
I had discussions with a couple of people, and after some investigation it’s been decided that the Lib Dem Voice blog will close to new contributions and comments on June 19th, and the forum will close on the same day. The blog will continue to be available as an archive for some time thereafter, forum posts will not – please ensure you take a copy of any posts that are valuable to you (maybe someone could create a private wiki ‘campaign manual’ out of the useful stuff?).
Running this blog has been a great project – lots of ups, tempered by the occasional down. I hope it’s been valuable to its target audience, Lib Dem activists. If any group (and I do suggest you have a group around you) starts up a similar project / successor blog, let me know and I’ll give you some prominent links to aid you in your site growth. For the moment, for discussion I commend to you the LDYS forum (irrespective of your age), and for blogs the ever excellent Lib Dem Blogs.
LDV will continue to operate until June 19th, but will wind down gradually in the week running up to that date (because I’ll be on holiday!).
Particular thanks to the team who regularly contributed content: Alex Foster (star Podcaster!), Richard Huzzey, Stephen Tall, Mark Pack. Thanks to Ryan Cullen for keeping an eagle eye on the forums, and to Will Howells who made a huge contribution before giving in to the lure of Cowley St!
Thanks to everyone who contributed content (in vaguely chronological order):
Alex Cole-Hamilton
Hywel Morgan
James Graham
Gavin Whenman
Alex Wilcock
Alison Goldsworthy
Chris Keating
Colin Ross
Colin Walklin
Greg Simpson
John Thomson
Paul Walter
Chris Huhne
Mark Valladeres
Martin Hoscik
Charles Anglin
Steve Cooke
Tim Gordon
Adrian Sanders
Serena Hennesy
John Stevens
Nick Harvey
Bridget Fox
Duncan Brack
Grace Goodlad
Carl Quilliam
Geoffrey Payne
Laurence Boyce
Kerry Hutchinson
Ed Maxfield
And of course, thanks to the commenters. As I say, I hope this has been a useful (and sometimes fun) blog to have around.
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55 Comments
This is very disappointing news as I think that this Blog fulfils a key role. Also Rob, I did offer to help you out a few weeks ago. I didn’t necessarily think that I was the best person to run LDV, but now that you are saying it will close down, I will renew my offer.
I am willing to take over the running of the Blog (but not the forum which I would close down). I have only a little web experience but I am more than willing to learn. And I am now a Lib Dem member! How about it Rob?
Laurence – please do it! LDV is my must read daily…
Very sorry this but well done for running it Rob, it has been great.
Rob, I am genuinely sorry about this. You have done a fantastic job. Surely to God there is SOMEONE out there in the LibDems who could take it over?
It is a terrible pity, and I will miss having a forum to float candidate selection issues (the old forum for Returning Officers doesn’t seem to function any more and it’s always nice to have an input from candidates, potential or otherwise).
Iain, I acknowledge the point that you’re making, but most of the people who might be qualified to take over are up to their eyeballs already. And with such a tough act to follow…
Well done, Rob. Sorry to hear that you’ve had to pack it in.
Rob
Thanks for all you’ve done. LDV will be missed.
Rob,
LDV is an excellent place and we, as Lib Dems, need such a place to be – especially the Forum. Why not see if there are enough people willing and available to run it as a “collective” along the Liberator model?
I, for one, would offer some time to such a project but do not have sufficient time to run the whole bang shoot, nor the experience! Good luck with the future and I hope to meet face-to-face,with you, in Brighton at Fed. Conf. Thanks for what you have enabled.
Sorry to see it go. But as Mark says, everyone who could do it is snowed under. Just a small cough Rob http://tinyurl.com/2xurpe
Woops – fixed
🙂
I’d be happy to take over. Obviously it would take a slightly different editorial direction.
This has been a must-read site. Engaging. Inclusive. Thoughtful. I genuinely hope this post will encourage someone or a group of people to come forward at this eleventh hour and ensure that this site continues…
If other people can be found to take over most of the editorial side, I’ll be happy to sort out things technically. I’m WordPress proficient I’ll have you know…
I’m more than willing to help in any way, as I’ve already indicated, but I get the impression that a decision has been taken to shut down the site regardless.
Shame to see it go!
A thought to bear in mind – if there is to be a successor, the blog and the forums are in practice largely independent from each other. One could set up a similar blog without worrying about the forums, or vice versa.
Oh well, seems that LD Cix will have to soldier on a bit longer…(which as it happens is still better for discussion).
But the loss of a (more or less) independent place for debate amongst Liberal Democrats is another blow to autonomous debate and democracy within the party.
I’ve been talking to some of the other regular LDV contributors, and we’re hoping to put together a successor. We’ll see how the intentions turn out when the details are crunched through this week… but regardless, many thanks for all your work on LDV Rob. I don’t think there are many things that would get such a diverse group of people agreeing as those on this thread 🙂
Rejoice! Rejoice!
Unclear whether Justin is rejoicing at Mark’s plans or the plans to close!
I can see the flames coming… Many saw the private forums a replacement for cix… much as such a forum has to evolve that hasn’t been the case. The downfall of the public side is the uncertainty of how “official” LDV is and the huge number of other Lib Dem Blogs. The media is evolving constantly, a phoenix is bound to appear from the ashes.
What is cix?
The rather annoying thing for me is that I have never even been able to get into the private forums. I can login, but then there are no forums there. I e-mailed Rob weeks ago, but got no answer. Maybe he really was too busy to open his inbox.
Will be sorry to see the site go if this happens.
P.S. The flames I refer to are with regard to the Phoenix, not me being flamed for what I said.
Cix is an online forum that has some private Lib Dem areas. Main disadvantage is it costs money to belong to it.
If I can help in any way please let me know
Re Duncan in 6, I think I understand that comment perfectly.
And in response to Guido, I would offer, but it would go off in a really odd direction. If it wouldn’t exacerbate certain problems I had recently, or wouldn’t provolke a divorce.
Well done on the achievement to date Rob and thanks.
NO!!! The biggest laugh on the net is going! Rob- try and develop your sense of humour! It needs some work!
This coming from a man who thinks calling the Lib Dems “LibbyDems” is cutting edge wit, and who hasn’t noticed that the constant prattle he posts to this site hasn’t been published for the last month.
Very sorry to hear that.
Although I’m new myself, I already appreciate LDV.
Here’s hoping that some activists pick this up and run with it.
Otherwise I will need something else for my sidebar aggregator.
Sorry to hear this.
Of course, it means that if you treat ConHome, LabourHome, and LDVoice as the “main” three “activist” websites, the LibDems have just lost theirs.
Rather sad to think we supporters may not have an independent forum anymore.
Cix will still exist and it is certainly an independent forum which still has the largest amount of independent info and discussion of any LD forum – though much less than when it was a virtual monopoly in the party.
As Duncan said it costs money to join. A very small amount in my view (less than the price of a pint a week) but one of the extraordinary things about the internet is that people have come to expect it all for free. This has distorted values and is part of the reason for the decline in circulation of newspapers which is a dreadful threat to a free and democratic society.
Tony Greaves
My Summer holiday’s coming up and I’m about to finish my exams I’d be glad to help out if anyone wants to take over!
I was a regular cix user for about 8 years and then found I just didn’t need it, didn’t bother checking it and in reality outgrew it. It was, at one time, really the only place to find Lib Dems on the internet, now we are everywhere.
In the circumstances, might I suggest a brilliant site dealing with ghost towns
http://www.ghosttowngallery.com/
“It was, at one time, really the only place to find Lib Dems on the internet, now we are everywhere.”
Isn’t this the problem? Most people do not have the time or inclination to search around “everywhere”. The whole this is hopelessly fragmented and getting worse by the day.
A second problme now is the way that so many people use anonymous names such as “Norfolk Blogger” which frankly makes me reluctant to take part in any discussion them them. If in a political community we are not real people we are nowhere people with no legitimacy of any kind.
Tony,
In fairness, ‘Norfolk Blogger’ is Nich Starling, as one can see by clicking on his name. A number of people post under pseudonyms that are merely amusing (I post as ‘Faceless Bureaucrat’ on another site I value) rather than an attempt to mislead.
I’ve been reading all the comments, but wanted to wait for the broad range of views to come in before adding my own. First, thanks for the kind words.
As to any possible successor:
I don’t believe a site of this nature can be successfully run by someone who has just joined the Lib Dems.
The other comments here about pitching in to a successor are the same as were made before I set up LDV – people saying (encouragingly!) that they’re happy to be part of a team, but don’t want to run it. In the end what it takes to actually make it happen is for someone to knuckle down and do it. Install the software, write, commission, and chase content day after day. Be prepared for it to intrude in to your personal time and private life when things kick off / go wrong technically. Be the driving force, in effect. Without such a ‘force’, it won’t happen.
I encourage anyone who’s been a member for a while to step up and help to create a successor. Without wishing to be patronising, it’s a role that might well suit someone who is retired / otherwise not in full time employment.
Eldoc in comment 23 highlights a problem I had – I struggled to find the time to provide ‘customer service’ to people who for whatever reason didn’t make it successfully through the process of getting in to the Forum. If starting this project from scratch, I’d leave out the forum – particularly as the LDYS boards are thriving.
There was a lot of talk, for a long time, about setting up a web forum. I tried the model I thought would succeed, and it had only limited success – others can decide if they want to pursue another model.
As to continuing the Lib Dem Voice name – I’m only nervous about that because it’s my perception that the site name is linked in the minds of people who know the site with my own name. If the new LDV went on to be massively controversial, I have selfish concerns about whether Lib Dem members might think ‘that brat Fenwick is up to trouble again’… If the leader of a new gang of people wants to allay my fears on that score, I’m possibly open to persuasion.
There is a market for a blog like this, I wholly believe that. In my head I can picture the much slicker, feature packed, content packed, discussion packed site of my dreams – a dream that can be achieved in a new LDV / other named site if people are prepared to commit to muck in.
I’ll sign off by tossing a final thought in the air which perhaps unfairly I haven’t discussed with any of the people I’m about to name:
A relatively small number of bloggers provide the majority of content in the Lib Dem blogosphere – I’m thinking of the likes of Nich Starling, James Graham, Stephen Tall, Paul Walter, Jonathan Calder, Peter Black and the ever fluffy Millennium Elephant. If they abandoned their own blogs and instead ran a collaborative effort, I believe they’d not only massively grow their own audiences, but also the audience for debating liberal politics online. Collectively, they could produce a fabulously compelling site.
Now that’s a good idea!
Well said Tony. The fragmentation of which you speak is what makes this site so necessary. Yet now we hear it is to be closed down. I would say that 90% of the stuff on the Lib Dem aggregator is not worth reading. If the party leadership had any balls, they would help promote and fund a site like this of their own accord. But of course they’d be far too concerned about any potential embarrassment to the party. And I totally agree that we should use real names if we wish to be taken seriously. With accountability, comes a degree of credibility.
And of course when Norfolk Blogger was on cix he was nejs, not Nich Starling.
I had thought about what Rob posts as his last thought as a best model for the future of LDV, it is sort of what I originally thought it was going to be – a sort of Liberator collective of the blog world (that should put a few people off :)) I think it is a very good model. Add an Alex Foster to the list…
Laurance – I think that’s both inaccurate and unfair. The reason the party hasn’t funded something like LDV is not because we wouldn’t want to, but because something funded by “the party” ends up being a very different creature.
That’s a pragmatic reason, rather than conspiracy or cowardice 🙂
In fact the party has been putting togther more official discussion/debating forums such as the manifesto website and the policy consultation web sites – these are of course work in progress, but they could never replace an ‘independent’ forum for members to initiate, post and discuss issues that may be hostages to fortune on ‘official’ site.
All power to your elbows
Greg
Mark, it needn’t be a very different creature at all; just a properly funded and clearly constituted creature; in much the same way as you can have a newspaper owner on the one hand, and an independent editorial line on the other. OK, the scheme breaks down occasionally but, when it does, people complain and resign, and everyone gets to knows about it. Ideally, LDV would be independent, but we’ve just seen the problem with an independent site. Without a sufficiently robust constitution, it’s liable to pack up just when it’s beginning to pick up speed.
I’d echo Mark and Greg’s comments – while there are a lot of benefits to the Party to having an online Lib Dem community, if the Party was putting up the money it would be a very different creature. Not least because the money isn’t the obstacle for LDV, the obstacle is the time commitment; if a staff member was making the sort of decisions that Rob has been doing, they would probably err much further on the side of caution.
Not to mention that it would be difficult to ask a staff member to put themselves in line for the kind of abuse which Rob has, on occasion, attracted in the line of duty…
Well time is money. And besides, I think that the fundamental problem is that LDV needs to be professionally constituted, otherwise we’ll just have a repeat of this episode. If it were to become a piece of stage managed Lib Dem propaganda, then it would be universally derided. As long as the party clearly recognised that, and put in place a strong independent editorial team, it would be fine. But don’t worry, it’s not going to happen in a month of Sundays. The party would never tolerate the sort of dissent that some of us want to indulge in.
Laurence – I think you are genuinely misguided on this point. Our party is more than happy to tolerate all sorts of dissent – in fact Liberals by their nature are awkward buggers and proud of it!
But Mark, Greg, Chris & co are absolutely right: if we want this site to be representative of the rich tapestry of opinion within the party, it can’t be ‘run’ by a member of staff. Try and put yourself in the shoes of that staff member – it wouldn’t be a lot of fun knowing when to ‘moderate’ discussions on here.
Oh, and a peripheral point perhaps, but our money hasn’t exactly got masses of cash or resources to spare. I’d rather a staff member were employed in campaigning (preferably outside Cowley St) than to run a site that can & should be run by volunteers.
Try and put yourself in the shoes of that staff member.
Actually, I want to be that staff member! As it stands, LDV will shortly be a “very different creature” anyway. A dead creature to be specific. And the party will be the worse for it.
So cheerful 🙂
Laurence, I think it would help your cause to have your own blog first, so the LD community online has more of a rounded picture of your offering. LDV would not, in my judgement, prosper as a stridently anti-establishment publication. We have Liberator for that…
Well of course I’m going to have to start my own Blog, though I didn’t particularly want to. The advantage of having my own Blog is that I won’t have to wait three days to get my articles posted with a bunch of typos as an added bonus 😉 The disadvantage is that I probably won’t get quoted in the Times or invited onto the BBC.
Three days I can live with as a fair criticism, but all I ever do with contributor’s copy is copy&paste it! No-one else had problems with mystery typos being introduced 🙂
Yes, you probably won’t get quote in the Times or invited onto the BBC. But to be honest you probably shouldn’t have been in the first place, and it was my mistake to put you in a position where you were able to. People who haven’t been party members long enough to receive their membership cards generally have the good sense not to go on the telly and speak on behalf of the grassroots. I was happy to give you a platform to speak to the party membership, I certainly never intended to provide you with a springboard to the national media. My mistake.
Ah, but that’s where you’re wrong because I made no secret with the BBC of my status, or lack of it, within the party. They specifically said that they wanted to hear from a new member. Furthermore, I made it absolutely clear in the televised conversation that I had only just joined the party. But of course it was all edited down to about thirty seconds worth which said very little in the end. So I think that “springboard to the national media” is possibly overstating it a little. And besides, the BBC segment was prompted by Sir Ming’s dismal poll ratings for Populus. It’s hardly my fault if he’s useless.
There seems to be some belief that you get ignored by the media by not appearing on some super group blog.
I’ve seen mulitple times where people’s individual blogs are quoted and articles made.
Peter Black is a great example and no longer needs to send press releases as the Welsh Media just copy and paste from the blog.
But you don’t need to be an AM, the BBC once called me an anorak!
Scurrilous swines! And you make a good point. The last time I did a bit of media it was ten seconds for the World At One at the end of last year, and it was on the back of something I’d written on my personal blog.
Just been away for the week and come back to see this. really sorry to see LDV wind up. i have very much enjoyed dipping into the blog of late. sounds like you’re going on a well earned holiday though.