This is a grab bag.
First, already 15 members have weighed in that they have found the Technorati tags useful.
Technorati has been "manually pinged" repeatedly today (Elaine estimates seven times) re: entries here. The site has been published and republished many more times than that.
If there's a problem, it's up to them advise. I've e-mailed them and received an automated reply:
Dear Technorati User,
Thank you for taking the time to drop us a line. If you are reporting a problem you may be having you will be contacted by a support technician once we have had a chance to review your message. If you don't hear back from anyone within a few business days then please let us know
[. . .]
It's the same reply that Elaine received on October 25, 2005. She contacted them twice since then and has still not been "contacted by a support technician."
If there's any word from Technorati, I'll note it here.
Unless the problem's addressed the only tags that will be used are these two "New York Times" and "Democracy Now." No other tags. No publishing and republishing, no manually pinging.
That's annoying, it takes forever and, now, it is worthless.
We all discussed this when we worked on the Headlines earlier today. Some have never wanted to tag (I haven't wanted to but I've been willing). All feel it's worthless if Technorati isn't going to read them.
While the sudden failure to read tags at Mikey Likes It!, Kat's Korner, Thomas Friedman Is a Good Man, and this site might have something to do with something switched when they were updating, the fact remains that there are ten sites in this community (check my math) and either all that use tags are read or I'm not using tags. That's me, that's for this site.
If the issue can be resolved, I'll return to tagging.
To those that enjoy tagging, I'd suggest doing it sometime. Only don't do it like I've done, do it like Rebecca's done. Where she's tagged every post for over two months, where she's registered with Technorati and put the code they say to in her template (which is why it shows up on her page and not just in an entry). Do all that and do it for two months (actually over two for Rebecca) and still not be recognized by Technorati. Then figure out if you "enjoy" tagging.
Here, it's been a problem while every entry has had to be published and republished and published again over and over while manully pinging over and over. I don't have that kind of time. One Saturday, I was desperate to get two entries up (one was a heads up to Laura Flanders) and it was just too much frustration. Both entries were written. They would normally go up one after the other, no hassle. Instead it was constant publish, republish, manually ping, publish, republish manually ping, publish, republish, manually ping, over and over.
Now let's note Joe Strupp's "Former Ombudsman Criticizes Woodward Arrangement" (Editor & Publisher):
Former Washington Post Ombudsman Geneva Overholser criticized her former newspaper, saying it should either sever its ties with Bob Woodward or require the legendary Watergate scribe to work solely for the paper, not pen his best-selling books on the side.
"It isn't an arrangement that can really work at the Post," said Overholser, who served as ombudsman from 1995 to 1998 and later as a Post columnist for three years. "If I were editor, I would say, 'Bob, you've got to pick.'"
Overholser's comments come one week after Woodward revealed that he had testified before special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald about a confidential conversation he had in 2003 with a White House aide about Valerie Plame's identity as a CIA analyst. He also disclosed that he had kept that conversation from Post editors for more than two years, revealing it to Executive Editor Leonard Downie Jr., just last month.
Overholser, who also served as editor of the Des Moines Register from 1988 to 1995, holds an endowed chair at the Washington bureau of the University of Missouri School of Journalism. While she praised Downie as an editor with great strengths, she also said his response to the Woodward situation -- allowing the writer's dual roles to continue, but with a demand for more communication on outside projects -- does not go far enough.
"I don't think he is acknowledging the degree to which this poses a problem for the Post," Overholser said. "To have Woodward operate this way."
From Media Matters we'll note "Matalin: 'Everybody in town knew' that Plame was at the CIA:"
On the November 21 edition of MSNBC's Imus in the Morning, Mary Matalin, a former assistant to President Bush and counselor to Vice President Dick Cheney, was the latest among many defenders of the administration to repeat the unsupported claim that former ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV himself disclosed the identity of his wife, CIA operative Valerie Plame. Criticizing special counsel Patrick J. Fitzgerald's investigation into the leak, Matalin asked, "What's the crime here?" She contended that "[e]verybody in town knew that, and who outed her was her husband -- 'my wife, the CIA wife' and all this stuff." Matalin offered no evidence to support her assertion that Wilson himself had introduced his wife in public settings as a CIA employee.
Media Matters for America has previously debunked several iterations of this rumor (here, here, and here). Purveyors of this rumor include former CIA operative Wayne Simmons, who claimed that Plame was "traipsed" and "waltz[ed]" around Washington by Wilson, who introduced her as "my CIA wife"; and Fox News legal analyst Andrew P. Napolitano, who reported that "at least one" of his Fox News associates heard Wilson present Plame as "my CIA operative wife."
The October 28 indictment of Cheney's former chief of staff, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby -- charging him with perjury, false statements, and obstruction of justice in the course of the leak investigation -- explains: "At all relevant times from January 1, 2002 through July 2003, Valerie [Plame] Wilson was employed by the CIA, and her employment status was classified. Prior to July 14, 2003, Valerie Wilson's affiliation with the CIA was not common knowledge outside the intelligence community."
Russ Feingold sits down for an interview with George Steph on ABC's This Week Sunday. That's your heads up. (In other news, Tales From the Crypt's David Broder leaves the crypt to haunt Tim Russert's roundtable on Meet the Press. As always, Broder will be attempting to pose as someone on the left.) CBS' Face The Nation features:
Presidential Historians Roundtable
Guests:
Ellen Fitzpatrick
Author, History's Memory, Writing America's Past
Joseph Ellis
Author, His Excellency: George Washington
James Reson, Jr.
Author, Dogs of God: Columbus, the Inquisition & the Defeat of the Moors
Stephen Carter
Author, Integrity
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