With the top 50 political blogs getting 95% of the traffic, has a Blogosphere Establishment formed? Does the word blogger suffice to describe people who may be practicing journalism, activism or campaigning for a candidate, sometimes all at once, sometimes not? Should top bloggers practice a kind of affirmative action in who they link to or highlight? Six top political bloggers tackle these questions and others...

UPDATED

If one blog post can point to a core demographics "way of thinking", then one could say that the outburst of discussion in the mommy blogosphere created by mommyblogger, The Queen of Spain, may indicate that Texas, Pennsylvania and Ohio will see a huge voting shift away from the former First Lady and current Senator of New York.

Why? The post I am going to quote after the jump may well be a quantifiable reflection of how white suburban mothers, Hillary Clinton's core constituency, are starting to move away from her to embrace Barack Obama.

The pyramid of Internet political functions consists of message (communications), money (fundraising) and mobilization. Atop that pyramid sits communications. Message drives money and triggers mobilization. Devoid of a compelling message to spur their use, the most advanced web tools will lie fallow. The impetus to use technology is always external to the technology; the impulse to connect and contribute begins with the inspiration to do so and the inspiration derives from the message.

Notwithstanding that hierarchy, the wave of Internet acclamation in the aftermath of the 2008 election has been focused primarily on mobilization and money, on networking tools and techniques, their effect on governance, and on the medium’s capacity to generate eye-popping revenue. Less noted is the impact of the ever-growing online commentariat whose pointed opinions shape our worldview and whose influence on the 2008 election was nothing short of decretive.

Ars Technica's Julian Sanchez has a fascinating report on models of the blogosphere's many-tendriled thought sharing that go far beyond information-thin "A is connected to B is connected to..." mappings...Don't let the acronyms fool you -- the SEC's embrace of XBRL is exciting stuff. The Securities and Exchange Commission has mandated that public companies and mutual funds publish their financial data in a common structured format...Stanford professor Larry Lessig was recently the guest of honor at a salon sponsored by Netroots Nation...and more.

As Sarah noted yesterday, the White House website got a facelift at 12:01 yesterday as the typically stuffiness of the White House web site smacked headlong into the calming blues of the Obama campaign/transition sites.

I thought I'd take a moment and share some thoughts.

From a design and technical standpoint, the site is fine. It's fairly light on content (and it's all static), but they're less than 24 hours in, so what can you really expect.

Recognizing that the site is content light, and technically "adequate" what else is there to talk about before they add depth? Well, that leads to most of my discussion...

The Obama Administration took its first major steps toward implementing its promise to make government more open and transparent, with two presidential memoranda covering freedom of information, transparency and open government. The first memo directing all agencies to "adopt a presumption in favor of disclosure." This is a 180-degree turn from the policies of the Bush Administration. Most interesting for e-democracy fans: The memo says "all agencies should use modern technology to inform citizens about what is known and done by their Government."

The second memo reiterates those points, and adds more detail. It calls for information about government operations and decisions to be put online, and urges departments and agencies to get public feedback on the information of the greatest interest to the public. Even more promising, in an explicit tip-of-the-hat to "web 2.0," the memo states...

• It was touch and go there for a while. Would Barack Obama emerge victorious from the first major face-off of his presidency? Would he prevail over the dark forces who sought stifle him? Obama for the win!
• You no doubt heard reports yesterday that new Obama White House staffers were upset to find themselves expected to communicate via smoke signals and semaphore. That's bunk, says former Bush Administration officials...
• Some are grumbling that the 72-hour-old WhiteHouse.gov is a huge disappointment...
• And more.

Does Gordon Brown have a digital trick or two to show President Obama? As change and greater digital access to information come slowly to the U.S. Government, it's more than worthwhile to delve into a newly-released beta report from the British Cabinet Office's Power of Information Task Force, which aims to reinvent the British people's interaction with their government.

Written by Ed Mayo and Tom Steinberg. the report is wide-ranging and though-provoking - much of it came together on wiki - and its authors explicitly link their work to the theme of American change: "Early signs from the Obama administration in the USA suggest that digital innovators in the Administration are thinking along about re-use of data along the lines above. "

Last week, Secretary Clinton's team at the State Department put up a short post on Dipnote, the departmental blog, asking for suggestions on technology and social media. It asked: "How Might the U.S. Utilize Innovative Technologies To Discuss U.S. Foreign Policy?"

The responses are illuminating and thoughtful, and worth reading by anyone considering the evolution of open government in the digital age.