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Contributing Editor Karen Walrond also blogs at her personal blog, Chookooloonks, and her new green shopping blog, Emerald Market.
I read with interest a recent post on the ever-brilliant Gallimaufry that the Barbados Labour Party has started a blog.
In my opinion, this is huge.
Blogging is still in its infancy here in the Caribbean, and the purview of the young and technologically-savvy. It is astonishing to me that a political party in the Caribbean has caught on to the fact that blogging might be a powerful way to reach its people -- and, conversely, for the people to reach the party. Titilayo, the author of Gallimaufry, says it beautifully:
[The blog] could do with a bit of work right now (grammar is important, people! and so is presentation!), but I think that the blog has the potential to be a good way for the BLP to present its views,and to open itself up to dialogue with the public, both their supporters and their detractors. In that regard, it certainly puts them a step ahead of the other political parties, the Democratic Labour Party and the People's Empowerment Party, neither of which even has a functioning website. It will be interesting to see how the blog develops, particularly as it comes to more people's attention and visitor traffic increases.
Interestingly, Titilayo muses that the move by the BLP to start their own blog might have been motivated by the presence of another blog, the Barbardos Free Press, an alternative, controversial, high-profile blog written by three individuals who aren't afraid to tell it like it is. If Titilayo is correct, and the BLP started their weblog in response to the Barbado Free Press? Then I say that this is a great day for citizen journalism -- for anything that forces any political party to listen to the people (or at least make motions to do so) is a good thing.