I can go to Opensecrets.org and tell who gave which politician money. There is no similar service to find the same type of information about us, or members of the media for that matter. Who gave which blogger money? I can’t imagine a service like this would ever be built. It would veer into privacy concerns. However, those who voluntarily agreed to be part of such a service would earn great trust.

The following quotes aren’t directly related to this, but their posts are good for thought. In one, Duncan Black is giving some great advice to local politicians in where to reach out to the netroots. In another Jeff Jarvis is turning down a request to attend and blog about a conference that he doesn’t agree with, and feels unconfortable being paid for:

Eschaton: Bottom Up:

I get far far less of this kind of thing than I imagine Kos does (very little, in fact, which is fine by me), but the best way for candidates to reach out to the netroots now is to begin by reaching out to local bloggers. No matter how much research I do I can’t possibly have any decent sense of the 470 odd federal races that will happen in ’06. More importantly, local races require local press and as we’ve seen local press will pay attention to local blogs in these kinds of things.

The real value of the netroots to campaigns won’t really be, for the most part, their ability to raise money. Sure, campaigns are always trying to get donations from anywhere they can and I can certainly understand that. I’m happy to suggest candidates for the Eschaton community to support. But, an email or phone call from a campaign manager isn’t going to do squat to encourage me to do that.

The buzz about campaigns, and the “infiltrating” into the netroots, is for the most part going to come from the ground up now. Reach out to local bloggers.

Jeff Jarvis: Blogging junket:

I got a most odd invitation to come to Nashville to blog Justice Sunday II Tom DeLay, Zell Miller, Chuck Colson, James Dobson, Tony Perkins, and Phyllis Schlafly. I got email with the offer but there’s also an open invitation here. That’s most odd, since I’ve held these events — and politicians sucking up to them — in disdain. But what’s interesting is that they offered to cover travel expenses. I said no thanks for a few reasons: don’t want to publicize their event, don’t want to take the money. But if any blogger does take their money, I hope it is disclosed.