Post like you mean it
So I managed to find some time—in between calls from the boss, waiting impatiently at the airport as his flight to Cannes was delayed 4 hours—to check out Arianna Huffington’s new celeblog Huffington Post.
My first impression: a resounding ‘meh’
To give my erstwhile employer credit, Ms. Huffington has managed to put together an impressive line-up of notables from Hollywood, Washington, etc., giving a centralized public voice to the outspoken liberal elites that red state America has been spoon-fed to detest so much. But yet, there’s something about this site, Huffington's self-proclaimed (at least privately) alternative to The Drudge Report, that is a real turn off. Something stale, something shifty, something too knowingly tongue-in-cheek or self-important to truly enjoy.
Essentially: blogs are SO 2004.
A brief smattering:
John Cusack eulogizes Hunter S. Thompson, though unfortunately negates all coolness points earned focusing on the Good Doctor by showing an unhealthy obsession in harping on the man’s death months after the fact.
David Mamet manages nearly 300 words without an F-bomb.
Julia Louis-Dreyfus and Brad Hall bemoan the rising tide of gay marriage in an oh-so-cute, we’re funny-and-married type of way. I mean, at least Larry David’s wife Laurie got her own blog space (though most likely she can thank the close personal relationship with Huffington Post’s E-Madame--and maybe the former's reported $100K investment in the launch of the site--for that honor).
Walter Cronkite, apparently angling for a new job at PBS.
The rest of the Post is essentially a Drudge-style headline screamer with a pseudo-snarky leftist tilt. Case in point, today's edition lead with a large photo (tho by no means equal to Drudge's must-see above the headline shots) of Saudi oil barons and, in 24-point type: "HUFFINGTON POST EXCLUSIVE: EMBARGOED BOOK CLAIMS SAUDI OIL INFRASTRUCTURE RIGGED FOR CATASTROPHIC SELF-DESTRUCTION". Ho-hum.
Overall, I must say I’m severely disappointed in what I’m seeing. At best, The Huffington Post seems to be a half-hearted attempt by Hollywood to sound off about the incisive social issues that face their nannies, personal assistants and private helicopter pilots on a regular basis. At worst, it is Ms. Huffington latest desperate attempt to try to stem her slow slide into intellectual obscurity reinvent herself as an important public figure after the social and political debacle that was the California Gubernatorial run off.
Unfortunately, all that I’ve read comes across as everything The Huffington Post swears not to be: pseudo-intellectual rants and missives from the Ivory Tower of Hollywood, pre-masticated for easy swallowing by a finicky liberal public who don’t, for the most part, CARE what Larry David thinks about John Bolton.
But there is some good news: LA Weekly’s resident flack-buster Nikki Finke manages to rip a new asshole for Ms. Huffington’s Hollywood elitist rabble-rousers. Man, I wish I’d read this before I wrote anything…I wouldn’t have bothered.
My first impression: a resounding ‘meh’
To give my erstwhile employer credit, Ms. Huffington has managed to put together an impressive line-up of notables from Hollywood, Washington, etc., giving a centralized public voice to the outspoken liberal elites that red state America has been spoon-fed to detest so much. But yet, there’s something about this site, Huffington's self-proclaimed (at least privately) alternative to The Drudge Report, that is a real turn off. Something stale, something shifty, something too knowingly tongue-in-cheek or self-important to truly enjoy.
Essentially: blogs are SO 2004.
A brief smattering:
John Cusack eulogizes Hunter S. Thompson, though unfortunately negates all coolness points earned focusing on the Good Doctor by showing an unhealthy obsession in harping on the man’s death months after the fact.
David Mamet manages nearly 300 words without an F-bomb.
Julia Louis-Dreyfus and Brad Hall bemoan the rising tide of gay marriage in an oh-so-cute, we’re funny-and-married type of way. I mean, at least Larry David’s wife Laurie got her own blog space (though most likely she can thank the close personal relationship with Huffington Post’s E-Madame--and maybe the former's reported $100K investment in the launch of the site--for that honor).
Walter Cronkite, apparently angling for a new job at PBS.
The rest of the Post is essentially a Drudge-style headline screamer with a pseudo-snarky leftist tilt. Case in point, today's edition lead with a large photo (tho by no means equal to Drudge's must-see above the headline shots) of Saudi oil barons and, in 24-point type: "HUFFINGTON POST EXCLUSIVE: EMBARGOED BOOK CLAIMS SAUDI OIL INFRASTRUCTURE RIGGED FOR CATASTROPHIC SELF-DESTRUCTION". Ho-hum.
Overall, I must say I’m severely disappointed in what I’m seeing. At best, The Huffington Post seems to be a half-hearted attempt by Hollywood to sound off about the incisive social issues that face their nannies, personal assistants and private helicopter pilots on a regular basis. At worst, it is Ms. Huffington latest desperate attempt to try to stem her slow slide into intellectual obscurity reinvent herself as an important public figure after the social and political debacle that was the California Gubernatorial run off.
Unfortunately, all that I’ve read comes across as everything The Huffington Post swears not to be: pseudo-intellectual rants and missives from the Ivory Tower of Hollywood, pre-masticated for easy swallowing by a finicky liberal public who don’t, for the most part, CARE what Larry David thinks about John Bolton.
But there is some good news: LA Weekly’s resident flack-buster Nikki Finke manages to rip a new asshole for Ms. Huffington’s Hollywood elitist rabble-rousers. Man, I wish I’d read this before I wrote anything…I wouldn’t have bothered.
posted by bd @ 5/09/2005 06:58:00 PM
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