The BlogTalkRadio Blog

by Jonathan Singer, Fri Mar 30, 2007 at 07:39:52 PM EST

It has been less that a month since Phil de Vellis, going by the nom de plume ParkRidge47, uploaded a short video entitled “Vote Different” to YouTube. In the time since, the homage to Apple’s famed 1984 commercial set to the background of Democratic presidential politics has been viewed several million times on the internet and countless more times on replays on the cable news networks, and has, in the process, sent a shot across the bow of politics as user-created content — not campaign driven product — reached voters around the country and had a small, though noticeable effect on a political campaign.

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As of this month BlogTalkRadio has implemented a new feature for its hosts. We are very excited to bring you “Live Help” and to be able to chat live with our hosts as you have questions. We are able to give you the help you need as it happen’s on a daily basis. From 9 am till midnight EST someone is available to answer any of your BlogTalkRadio quesions.

Your Live Help chat feature can be found at the top right-hand corner of your dashboard. You can find it written in red letters, and with one click of a mouse a BlogTalkRadio technician is on hand to help you with your BlogTalkRadio needs.

Here is an example of where to find the link to the chatbox……..just click on LIVE HELP when activating.

Here is an example of what the chat box looks like……..

Once again we bring you yet another exciting new feature for your use on BlogTalkRadio.

We want to welcome Jill Robinson to BlogTalkRadio. Jill runs a writers group in London called The Wimpole Street Writers Group, and has written many novels.

Jill Robinson was born in Los Angeles. She is well-known for her talks on Hollywood Myths and Legends; stories about her childhood in Hollywood, life at her father’s studio, and LA during the black-listing years. Her father was Oscar and Tony winner, Dore Schary, head of MGM during the 50s and the only writer to ever run a film studio. Her mother, the artist, M. Svet, studied at the Art Students League in New York.

Robinson’s first book With A Cast of Thousands, was about growing up in Hollywood. After she moved to New York, she wrote for Cosmopolitan Magazine, during the template Helen Gurley Brown years. Robinson also covered trials for the The Soho Weekly News. In 1974, her memoir Bed/Time/Story won a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts. The novel Perdido established Robinson as a serious American writer. Vanity Fair described Past Forgetting as “the astounding chronicle of her journey to recover her memory.” This experience encouraged her to start the Wimpole Street Writers’ Workshop, which attracts some of the most original young writers in London.

Robinson has reviewed books and written articles for The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, The Chicago Tribune, The Washington Post, and American and French Vogue. Recently, she wrote a series of columns on being an American in London for the Daily Telegraph Saturday Magazine. Her Vanity Fair story on Roman Polanski was included in George Plimpton’s book, The Best American Movie Writing for 1998.

Robinson has taught Master Classes for the National Foundation for the Advancement of the Arts and has lectured on writing around America and Britain. She toured with her husband, the English writer Stuart Shaw, reading their play Falling in Love When You Thought You Were Through (adapted from their book).

While Rush Limbaugh has a larger listening audience, Ed Morrissey from the hugely popular conservative blog Captains Quarters will soon join the ranks as a full time Blogtalkradio staffer.

In a post on Ed’s blog entitled When The Hobby Becomes The Profession, Ed discusses his decision to leave the life as a call center manager and delve full time into the world of new media in the form of Blogtalkradio.

Ed, who will be joining as our Political Director on April 16th, will be responsible for many exciting projects including the development of a daily afternoon broadcast, introducing more conservative bloggers to BTR, interviewing candidates from Presidential and Congressional races, etc.

From the outset, I always wanted Blogtalkradio to be a fair and balanced platform where bloggers on the left, right and center could express themselves on one common platform. Quite frankly, I am tired of the polarization not just with tradtional media but with the political blogsopshere as welll.

With the help of James Boyce, Nate Wilcox and Lowell Feld, we have currently have 111 political hosts on Blogtalkradio including hosts broadcasting shows from Ireland, Brazil, Italy and many other countries. Now with Ed about to join, the party will only get bigger and better. Stat tuned…

Finally, a few minutes ago at 9:00PM EST, I noticed that we were broadcasting 15 live shows during the 9:00 hour. That my friends is a record and so is the number of shows we are airing today….101!

Now that’s kind of cool.

Alan