As part of the Guardian's recent redesign and a major internal overhaul, a new blog-fuelled feature called Today on the web now appears in the newspaper at at the foot of page two. Some journo called Ben Rooney selects a daily topic of current interest (recently it's been IRA arms, net censorship and Turkish EU entry), then Googles for appropriate blog snippets and prints them in the paper. Write something quotable today and your ramblings could appear in the national press tomorrow read by an audience of hundreds of thousands. Alas, I can't provide you with a link to show you what I mean because, somewhat surprisingly, this feature doesn't seem to appear in the online content of the Guardian's website. But as an opportunity to gain wider recognition, it's got to be worth a shot.
There now follows a desperate attempt at being both psychic and pithy in an attempt to whore diamond geezer into Thursday's Guardian, whatever tomorrow's topic might be (Hi Ben, hope you're well, and a short version of my URL is dgeezer.net if that shoehorns better into the available space). Let's see if I'm with the zeitgeist...
Conservative Party Leadership: The Tories in their death throes appear completely preoccupied debating their faults openly amongst themselves, whereas they ought instead to be convincing the people who really matter - the bloggerati - that they still have something to offer.
Hurricane Stan: This improbably-named storm in the the southern Carribean may have killed far more people than did its big sister Rita, but none of them are American. Global media silence condemns Stan's victims as being worth less and somehow worthless.
Chelsea walkover: It's no coincidence that the Blues' rouble-fuelled dominance comes at a time when Premiership crowds are in decline. This is a savage indictment of the new soccer reality where the balance sheet means more than a clean sheet, where bookkeepers outrank goalkeepers, and where the only goals are corporate.
Asteroid strike: Today's unexpected meteor impact in the Australian outback has acted as a long overdue wake-up call to humankind. On this occasion only several square miles of sand and a few plants have been vaporised - but next time we might not be so lucky. Our astronomical insignificance should never be underestimated.
Mint sauce crisis: Food lovers up and down the nation will rejoice at the news that Tesco have relaunched their squeezy bottle of this much-loved condiment. It may cost a little more than before, and contain a little less, but it tasted damned good on my pie last night. Good to have the little squirt back.
: We should not be surprised by latest developments, although the current situation is clearly both undesirable and untenable. The world will judge us tomorrow by our actions today. Let us not be found wanting.
Guardian redesign: Who needs to employ journalists when you can lift up-to-the-minute content direct from the web? Welcome to the new media.
