Blue Man

Why bother blogging? What are you getting that the mainstream media are missing?
We’re pretty open about where our bias lies. That adds a level of transparency that’s maybe missing from the mainstream media. We don’t have pressure on us to sell newspapers. If there is a story like the Cadillac business [Governor Deval Patrick’s choice for his official car], a headline grabber, we can write about it if we feel like it, but there is no pressure on us.

But do bloggers need to be as accountable for what they write as the mainstream media?
The only accountability we have is to the readers of the site. If they are bored they will just go away. We do try hard to get our facts right, not just to get more eyeballs. It’s a hard debate whether bloggers are journalists. I will tell you what we are not: We are not reporters. We don’t have the time to go find the news. In terms of getting scoops, it happens occasionally by chance. We depend heavily on the people who do news gathering for a living.

So you think the Cadillac story got too much coverage?

It made great headlines, but it was incredibly short money.

But wasn’t it about the symbolism?
I am not going to defend the way the administration handled it. They made mistakes.

As you say, your bias is clear. What do you think was the legacy that Mitt Romney left behind?
[Laughing.] One of neglect. We had a governor who started running for president two and a half years ago, and that’s not good for the state. There were some great ideas early on. They talked a lot about “smart growth.” But as soon as Romney started looking at the national stage, he realized those ideas would not play well in South Carolina.

So you also sing opera, and you’re a lawyer?
Yes, I have two careers going. The opera is a freelance career. I have a law office, but it’s a long story.

Do you have a favorite opera to sing?
There are so many. I love Mozart’s Marriage of Figaro.

How much traffic does the site get now?
We’re around 3,000 [unique visitors] a day. The highest days we had were closer to 10,000, on primary day and Election Day.

Do you think Blue Mass Group influenced the outcome of the election?
It’s very hard to say. I like to think we played some role and generated some kind of interest, got the Internet-savvy political activist crowd, and served as a forum and a gathering place for those people. But as to actually what role we played, I don’t think blogs by themselves translate into votes in any direct way.

– Doug Most