Welcome to the Huffington Post's newest feature, "Eat The Press!" This page will be the nexus of all of HuffPo's media coverage, from blog posts to news briefs to top headlines every day, plus blogosphere reaction, spin, whispered conjecture, appropriately disclaimed rumors and all the chatter from across the national conversation. We're pretty excited.
The crux of "Eat The Press" will be our coverage of all areas of the media, from newspapers, magazines, TV, radio, podcast, vidcast, blogging, vlogging, and whatever else is out there. Between new assaults on freedom of the press, attacks on its coverage (rightly or wrongly), and the most secretive administration ever during some pretty scary times, a healthy, functioning Fourth Estate is more essential than ever. We'll be keeping a watchful eye out for blunders, bias and conflicts, but "Eat The Press" will also be celebrating the best of the profession, from incredible investigative work to evocative, moving prose to hilarious observations to just great writing that is in turn charming, funny, thoughtful, insightful, challenging, witty and twin-riffic. We will also be using words like "twin-riffic."
You'll notice that "Eat The Press" has all sorts of fun features, starting with the ridiculously addictive "People Ranker" to the left. Every day we'll be plugging in different names and clocking the Zeitgeist from around the blogosphere, plus changing up the last "wild card" slot just to keep things interesting. In the meantime, go ahead and experiment with the names (and see what I mean by "ridiculously addictive"). We'll also be tracking the most popular stories online (often hilariously different, but always illuminating, especially if you're wondering what to name your next child) and keeping up with media stocks courtesy of Yahoo! Finance (invest in print! Really, it's doing great!). We're also excited about our "Spin The Press" feature, where we'll raise an eyebrow or three at the blatant spin that is fed so often into our daily media diet (yes, Robert L. Bradley Jr. of the Houston Chronicle, CO2 is good for the environment! Just ask the Competitive Enterprise Institute, funded by Exxon Mobil!). Send us your spin - we have no doubt you'll find plenty.
Today marks the first day of the rest of ETP's life, having been founded by Harry Shearer when the Huffington Post first launched. Since then, the ranks of HuffPo's media-watchers have swelled and we now have a great and ever-growing group of media critics, members and observers to share insights about what's being covered, and how it's being covered, why - and what's being left out. Like on HuffPo's main page, ETP bloggers will also be encouraging a lively discussion in the comments section, and we'll be highlighting some of the best from the bleachers in our "Best of Comments" section, updated on a rolling basis.
That's it - for now. Take a look, browse around, leave a comment, see how you rank against Lindsay Lohan, or Al Gore, or Angelina Jolie (apparently she had a baby recently). Thanks for reading and keep watching this space for more tasty tidbits and spicy media morsels here at "Eat The Press!"