Reading Ana's post about what news sites like Politico.com can do next to "own" political debate content, I think it is interesting that a site with even fewer resources or infrastructure at its disposal, namely fivethiryeight.com, became so big. The founder of FivethirtyEight.com, Nate Silver, a statistician with BaseballProspectus, speculated about his own fate and the fate of the audience:
He suspects that Nov. 4 was the height of his popularity, and that producers will not be phoning as frequently any time soon. Publishers have been calling about a book, and he will continue with FiveThirtyEight, using it to predict Congressional votes during the Obama administration — if anyone cares.“That’s the paradox,” he said. “You would think that you elect this guy and you want him to effect change, and then he gets elected, and people don’t care about bills being passed.”
That is, sadly, the state of our fickle attention. For all the interest built up in the election, I think there is a now-what element to a lot of people's reading habits. The Obama transition team's Change.gov is a good start to focusing the attention of the electorate on the business of governing, and it just so happens that much of the Web 2.0 technology suite is well-suited to organizing people.
But we will eventually have to take part, to build something real and true and beyond the walls of our social networks.