Catchup: MetroVox About six weeks ago, you may remember, the Metro newspaper launched a new online blogging presence in conjunction with the Vox 'social blogging' service. This was part of a sponsorship deal associated with the newspaper's Best of Brit Blog Awards 2007 - a questionable competition which you can only win if you're willing to say "thank you for my laptop" in public. But, I hear you ask, how's the MetroVox blog doing? A good question. The blog's authors kicked off in mid-February by accidentally deleting their first post, then leapt in with an optimistic follow-up entitled "Hello World". This initial outburst attracted five comments (60% of which were about the deleted first post). This online conversation was something of an achievement given that the Vox system only allows Vox members to post comments, and very few Vox members seemed to be taking an interest. The rest of the world could only read, fail to respond and move on. A slow drip of link-rich posts has followed, mostly on Friday afternoons, but there have been no further comments. None whatsoever. It's not quite the "vibrant community" that the Metro newspaper initially envisaged. The very last response, way back on February 24th, asked "Can I ask why you didn't go with livejournal or moveable type? (or wordpress!!)". Because the Vox blogging service, it seems, is suitable only for private focused communities disinterested in external contact. And totally ineffective at encouraging debate amongst newspaper readership. I know that comments aren't the be-all and end-all of a blog, but it's nice to think that someone might one day leave a response. I wonder how many more weeks the MetroVox blog will carry on without any response whatsoever.
