OnePolitics: concept proved

OnePolitics is a self-described 'proof of concept' site which pulls together all the the web 2.0 offerings like blogs from the MSM's political coverage.

It was made by Simon Dickson and he calls it 'an RSS aggregator for people who don’t get RSS' (which would be most people).

Lots of political journalists now blog and onepolitics really helps anyone who wants to keep up with what's on the mind of that group. I'm one of them and the concept has been proved for me by my actually using it.

So instead of clicking through various bookmarks I get a quick 'top-down shot' of what's going on as well as an easy way to see what's being said about 'hot topics'. I should say I do use RSS but it sits neatly with clicking through the MSM front pages, which you can't do in Google Reader, you have to open the websites.

The downside is probably it's automatic nature. My favorite site which performs a similar role is Memeorandum and it's sister site Techmeme which combine automation with some background editorial involvement (mainly in the choice of sources but probably more than that) and has additional layers so you can see reactions and counter-reactions. During the campaign it's the automation which has let it down.

Memeorandum has quickly developed into masses of stories disappearing into similar threads and thus not really helping you find the good stuff or follow the reactions easily because there's just too much. This is a result of an explosion in US political blogging and maybe they'll tweak things to refine it better but it does show the still needed role of humans and especially editors if, as I'd expect, this also happens here.

• More about it and how Simon put it together.