Photo from source, Times Online
As you probably know by now, internet star Matt Drudge "outed" Prince Harry of England's role in the conflict in Afghanistan. The whole of the British media had a pact, apparently, not to report the story, to protect the safety of Harry and his compatriots.
Was Drudge wrong to blow Harry's cover on The Drudge Report (an site akin to a blog, but not a blog), in order to put another feather in his cap? My gut reaction is, "yes, he was wrong," but that's not really what this post is about.
What I don't understand is Drudge's popularity in general. As far as I understand it, The Drudge Report is a news aggregator, culling stories of (far-) right interest, and posting links and photos to those stories. Nothing wrong with that. But I don't find actual content at the site, though maybe I'm not navigating it properly or something.
What I'm getting at, is that in most news reports of this story, and others regarding Drudge, he is painted as a journalist, investigative reporter, a writer, etc. But does he write? Or is he basically doing what I'm doing, only without the commentary? Is he merely skilled at sniffing out where the stories are, or is he actually a talented writer? Because I can't ever find anything but links there. As I said, maybe I'm missing something.
[Excerpt]
Someone blabbed, and Drudge pounced
For a man whose notoriety is based on the speed with which he vacuums up sensational information and immediately regurgitates it upon an unsuspecting world, the question can only be: what took him so long?
Read more at: Times Online
Now see what I did there? I wrote editorial commentary, posted an excerpt of a story, and then a link to the site. Maybe I should just simplify, and run pages and pages of links. Maybe then my site meter would register hits like Drudge, who probably gets my 9-month total in about 15 minutes. Y'think?
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