How Political Diarists Power RedState, Daily Kos, MediaShift.

The open community function of such sites begs the question of whether they should allow the community to decide what material is ideologically appropriate (similar to the philosophy of social news site Digg), and what role the diarists play in relation to the front-page posters. Recently I spoke to several diarists at the more popular sites to gain an understanding of what motivates them to spend hours of their time writing for them (after all, they don't get paid) and what effects they have on influencing public discussion compared to the powerful front-page posters.