Howard Stern is leaving K-Rock for satellite radio, where fart jokes and midget strippers will live on. Go Howard. To fill that all important frat boy market, K-Rock has been looking for replacements. Instead of just one guy, they are going for the team approach. David Lee Roth (nice hairplugs, dude) and Adam Carolla have signed on.
The team approach is winning in the blogosphere,too. Not only do we have Huffington Post and TPM Cafe, but two more group blogs are making their debut.
Dan Drezner tell us that he's getting swallowed up Pajamas Media. And The Plank is a group blog from the New Republic that is off to good start by not promising much.
Good-bye to the solo project. There is solidarity in numbers.
Yeah, I don't know what to think about all this. On the one hand, I often stand back in awe of some of the group blogs and realize that there is no way to compete. They can read and digest and post at speeds that no one person could match (except maybe Glenn Reynolds). They can take a day off or even a week off and their readership doesn't evaporate. They probably even have time to answer comments and e-mail. They can pool resources for fancy layouts. By combining readerships, they can assemble the numbers necessary to rake in the big advertising bucks.
On the other hand, the end result isn't always so great. I check out TPM for only maybe one or two guys. Now that Podhoretz has stopped posting at The Corner, I probably won't lurk there anymore. There's nobody in the Pajama group that I'll read other than Dan. There will always be one or two people doing the heavy lifting in these group projects.
I also worry about diluting personality in these group efforts. No one person's quirks and charms dominate, instead you get a boring blend. You also lose one of the fun parts about blogging -- the jerry rigged blog full of cable accessy bloopers and genius moments.
Group blogs, like group radio, are safe, but boring. There's no replacing Howard.