[cornell-libertarians-disc] [Politics_CurrentEvents_Group] Political Columnists Wanted

Political Columnists Wanted

Political Columnists Wanted

A new political website that features opinion columns, blog entries,
and editorials from all over the political spectrum on a wide variety
of political issues announced today that it is seeking aspiring
columnists.

Virginia-based Nolan Chart LLC launched its new website August 19,
2007 for people who like to read about political issues from a wide
variety of perspectives. Since then, a beta-testing period has been
completed, and the site is now looking for people interested in
publishing their own political columns on the world-wide web,
regardless of their political leanings.

"I strongly believe that this website is going to become very popular,
very quickly among those with an interest in the political realm,"
says Nolan Chart LLC's founder, Walt Thiessen. "It's the only
political website that intentionally brings conservatives, liberals,
centrists (moderates), libertarians, and statists (authoritarians)
together in one place to discuss the issues of the day, issues that
affect all of us. It will not surprise me if this website soon becomes
one of the most popular websites on the World Wide Web."

The Nolan Chart is based on an idea originally created by political
scientist David Nolan, who sought to expand the left-right spectrum to
include political viewpoints that don't fit neatly on a single
political line. He expanded the one-dimension line usually used to
express the range of political views into a two-dimensional chart
(similar to a graph), which in addition to liberals and conservatives
also differentiates libertarians and statists (or authoritarians, as
they're sometimes called). Nolan Chart LLC has taken the basic concept
of Nolan's chart and turned it into a website for discussing political
issues.

Aspiring columnists can easily sign up for an account online at the
company's website at: www.nolanchart. com. The entire signup process
only takes about five minutes, after which the columnist can
immediately begin to publish their first article using the site's
built-in control panel. Besides supplying their contact information,
they are also asked to confirm their agreement (a) not to use their
columns to issue personal attacks (ad hominems) against others; (b) to
honor the copyrights (or other rights) of other people; and (c) not to
spam the website for the purpose of promoting products or other
websites. The focus is on maintaining lively political debate based on
the facts (and opinions) relating to the issues, and the website's
policies will be actively enforced. Readers will have numerous
opportunities for reporting violations of the website's policy. All
reported violations will be investigated and appropriate action taken
as deemed necessary by company management.

Finally, aspiring columnists are also asked to take a short,
10-question survey on major political issues, in an effort to identify
approximately where the columnist in question would fall on the Nolan
Chart. The survey bears some similarity to the World's Smallest
Political Quiz offered by the Advocates for Self Government, yet it is
quite different in many ways, particularly in the way it offers
options for each survey question representative of all the main
political camps. Also, many of the issues surveyed are different from
the issues included in the Advocates' quiz. The columnist is only
required to take the survey once. After that, the answers supplied by
the columnist are saved and used to show the columnist's political
viewpoint on the chart with each future article he or she publishes.

"This is the perfect opportunity for people who already actively
contribute to political discussions online to take their messages to
the next level. Bloggers, Yahoo! Group participants, people who right
letters to the editors of their local newspapers, and political
activists are all likely candidates for being a columnist," Thiessen
added. "Nolan Chart LLC will make columns available to all interested
persons, without any pre-selection process. We'll let the readers and
visitors to the website decide which columnists deserve the more
prominent positions on the website."

Readers will also be given the opportunity to give their comments and
feedback on articles they read on the website by the various
columnists. They will also be able to give their "thumbs up" to
individual articles that they like.

One of the more interesting features of the website is the Nolan Chart
itself. Every article on every topic will include a picture of the
chart, showing where the columnist normally appears on the chart. The
chart will be reader-interactive: by clicking on a quadrant or "camp"
of the chart, the reader will be taken to other articles within that
same topic by columnists who are represented within the camp clicked
on by the reader. In this way, readers will be able to easily compare
and contrast differing political viewpoints on any given issue at the
click of a mouse!

The company hopes to earn profits by selling Google advertising on the
website. Once the site begins to earn income, revenues will be shared
with columnists based on their readership and popularity on the
website. Details of the revenue sharing program will be made available
at a later date, once the website starts seeing revenues.

To create a columnist account and begin writing a column, visit
www.nolanchart. com.

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