Overnight Celebrity

Here's a link to a blog that has become tremendously popular overnight for its coverage of Alaskan politics. I, like several other voting age Americans I'm sure, was on the Internet searching for more information on the Republican vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin when I came across it. So far, the blog has received attention from the Chicago Tribune company and several other political bloggers.

Mudflats
Tiptoeing through the muck of Alaskan politics

Its recent claim to fame goes to show that blogging about a topic you love, no matter how insignificant it may seem to...I don't know, people in the 49 other United States of America...can payoff given the right conditions.

So, yay! for a now much more exciting national political race. And yay! for new media reporting. It should be noted that the blogger wrote that he'll be going to Wasilla - Palin's former mayorialship - during the Labor Day weekend to take photos and get local reaction. This is a good example of a one-man-band doing a job formerly performed by working journalists backed by company money. I say, good for him.

But, from a media business model standpoint: how can you make people pay for news that someone else (i.e. this blogger) will gather for free because he loves the subject matter that much?