Are single author blogs finished?

That is the contention of Chris Gibson and Patrick Dunleavy writing in the latest edition of PSA News. They argue, 'The truth is that the single-author blog model has already gone out of fashion. Without consistently strong posts, and an easy way of finding them, there is no readership. All the effort made in writing and posting will typically be wasted.'

They argue that 'the vast majority of popular political blogs are now multi-author blogs; that is, themed and coherent blogs run by a proper editorial team and calling on the services of multiple authors to ensure that the blog remains topical, can cumulate a great deal of content and can ensure a good 'churn' of high quality posts.'

This approach is represented by LSE's own blog which is found here: LSE

I note that they have a managing editor which means that resources have been found from somewhere whereas most bloggers are working on their own, some very successfully (Guido Fawkes). An editorial team also means some form of control which may not encourage thinking outside the box.

Not that I pretend to be thinking outside the box. One review of this blog states, that it 'fails to really excite or even raise the temperature of its reader.' Well, of course, I am not trying to raise anyone's temperature. Anger rarely produces good policy, and this is a blog which is interested in analysis not polemic as the title implies.

It is the least successful blog I write as the numbers for this year in terms of hits show:

Political Economy of Football 325,022
Addick's Diary (Charlton) 173,229
Common Agricultural Policy 18,433
Analysing British Politics 12,291

Numbers for this blog are up year on year and as to some extent it is simply a way of sorting out my own thoughts, I will be carrying on in 2011.