You know how the saying goes: for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. It works that way in the ever evolving online communities we participate in, too.

Today I received a request from someone who had posted a comment in one of our blogs some time ago. The person apparently regrets what they wrote that day and now would like us to remove the comment. The user came to this decision when they typed their name into Google and a link to this comment is the first item on the results page.

I'm reading more and more these days about how people are trying to control their online identity. The way Google works, the web page with your name on it that has been linked to the most times is the one that will come up first. It's not the one you may want, such as your Facebook, MySpace or LinkedIn page. And it may be one that you really don't want, such as a negative news article or blog post. (This is a new problem in the public relations world.)

So what can you do if you don't like the results of a vanity search on Google? You can either try to get the top result removed or create some content that eventually will push down the entry you don't like. The best way to control your identity is to have your name registered as a URL. (Like a lot of people, I wish I would have jumped on markbriggs.com 10 years ago.) Then start a blog on that domain and get a lot of people to link to it.

Any thoughts on whether I should help this user out and remove the comment that is coming up first in their vanity search? Post a comment and let me know.

Pardon me while I toot the company horn here, but Joe Barrentine's video from Sunday's Salishan package is worth a look. It includes interviews with past residents mixed with historical photos and some bluesy background music. Pretty cool stuff.

Is it the middle of the month already? Wow, time flies. Although I try to do this report around the first of the month, I'm a little tardy this month. My bad.

The most popular blogs on thenewstribune.com in January:
1. Seahawks Insider
2. Lights & Sirens
3. Bring the Noise
4. Biz Buzz
5. Prep Blog
6. Huskies Insider
7. Political Buzz
8. Open House
9. Grit City
10. Ed's Diner

The most popular stories on thenewstribune.com in January:

1. Wildlife officials try to scare away Steller sea lions feasting on Columbia River sturgeon (Gordon)
2. ‘That little boy deserves justice' (Mulick)
3. Playoff payoff for Seahawks in 10 easy pieces ( McGrath)
4. Volleyball coach accused of rape (Lynn)
5. Bedard trade to Mariners stalls (LaRue)
6. Let Taylor talk rest in peace, too (McGrath)
7. M's get ace, nobody dies (McGrath)
8. Seahawks seek to defy odds facing them in Green Bay ( Boling)
9. Contractor violations database (Demsky/Ritchie)
10. Questions loom for Holmgren, Hawks (Hughes)

In case you missed it, online social networking is all the rage these days. Facebook, MySpace and LinkedIn are the leading web sites for this, but group sites like Ning and Yahoo and Google Groups also have millions of users. But not everyone is on board. Does your father belong to Facebook?

Jason Feffer knows social networking. As employee No. 4 at MySpace in 2003, he helped grow the site into the digital giant it is today. His take on the state of social networking today: "It's boring."

So Feffer has a new project that he hopes will be the next stage in the evolution of social networking. SodaHead.com is a Los Angeles-based web site with impressive technology and vibrant interactivity based on polls. SodaHead allows users to ask any question they want. Then other users answer and rate others' poll questions, and discuss the issues presented in the polls with one another. "We're flipping social networks upside down," Feffer told me recently during a phone interview. "Users find people through issues they're passionate about.

"We've made the Internet familiar to people who aren't used to social networks."

I tried it out recently and found it easy to use and recommend it to those of you who are blogging and want to tap into the power of their widget-based polls. You can create a poll and then embed it on your blog and allow your readers to interact with their technology.

So what do you think about social networking? Weigh in on this question with the poll I created on SodaHead's site. (Note: unfortunately our blog platform doesn't allow embeddable widgets, one of many reasons we're moving to a new platform.)

SodaHead has already had more than 41,000 questions created, and it just came out of beta in September.

"Users are not looking to meet friends of friends of friends, Feffer said. "Now that everyone's connected with Facebook, LinkedIn, etc. we're not trying to meet new people. It's boring. There's nothing to do one you set up your profile. At SodaHead we flipped it and instead of putting the profile as the centerpoint, we said let's put the content first meaning the issues that I'm passionate about."

A new community blog has sprouted in DuPont and it's full of insider insight with a hyperlocal - and edgy - approach.

realdupont.com is an attempt by its creator (who asked for anonymity) to serve as place for residents to share their voice. Here's how he told it to me via email:

It is my hope that by remaining anonymous that the site and forum content would be perceived to belong to the people in town. I also did not want to appear be pushing an agenda as I have no political or business aspirations in town, just opinions.

DuPont is a planned community but not everything has gone to plan. DuPont's growth since the Northwest Landing development has left the town searching for its own identity, an identity devoid of the platitudes of the developers and Realtors. In spite of this, DuPont
remains a desirable and interesting place to live.

The blog posts I sampled over the past couple weeks were pointed and the discussion was occasionally combative. It will take a while for the blog to find its audience. It's not for everyone, but that's what makes the web great.

By the way, what do you call someone from DuPont? A DuPontian? A DuPontite? A DuPer? Just wondering.

I posted a couple weeks ago about the lackluster performance of mainstream media journalists attempting some liveblogging of events. Well, I'm happy to note today that we picked the right people to do the liveblogging of the presidential campaigns.

If you want to know what it was like to be at either the Clinton or Obama rallies today, check out Niki Sullivan and Scott Fontaine on the Political Buzz blog. I'm taking no credit for their brilliance, just trying to share it.

Here's a roundup of the best Washington election coverage that can be found on the web. It's the product of a social bookmarking experiment where journalists from The News Tribune and other area newspapers collaborate with political bloggers and others to compile a reading list of coverage from all around the web.

The Publish2 Election News Network is powered by technology from Publish2, the brainchild of a well-known media blogger named Scott Karp. Earlier this week, the Knoxville News in Tennessee hosted its own version of the experiment, inviting a small group of Tennessee bloggers and journalists to participate.

"There’s a huge opportunity to help voters find the best election coverage in the sea of election content," said Karp.

We're reaching out to bloggers and other journalists to invite them to participate. Unfortunately, there wasn't a lot of advanced planning for this; it's very much a work in progress. Our participation began with an email from Scott two days ago.

Give it a look and let me know what you think. We'll be testing this collaborative social bookmarking technology in other content areas, so if you're interested in participating give me a shout.

I've been a fan of the Seattle-based Web 2.0 news site Newsvine since it launched a few years back. Recently the site was acquired by MSNBC, bringing together arguably the best mainstream online news organization with arguably the best independent online news site.

Last week, the two forces produced that type of innovation you would expect. Nightly.newsvine.com is a conversation-focused page based on NBC-TV's Nightly News with Brian Williams. Visitors can ask questions of the anchor and - get this - he answers some in a candid, unrehearsed video response following the national broadcast of his show.

Here's how Newsvine CEO Mike Davidson described it in his blog:

News agency broadcasts the news -> audience discusses the content -> audience shoots back questions to the anchor -> anchor answers (select) questions right on the site

Maybe I’m biased because this is partly my baby, but I just think that is super cool, and super significant.

I also think it’s great that Brian — probably the most recognized face in U.S. National news — answers all questions off the cuff, with no teleprompter, and with a level of frankness you don’t often see on national news broadcasts. In responding to one of the questions, he even mentions his political affiliation (independent), which is rare for news personalities to do.

NOTE: OK, so that's two consecutive MSNBC-related posts on this blog. We now resume our regularly scheduled (and South Sound-based) programming.