[A little earlier:]

Completetosh: "Well, my prediction would be that…"

Presenter: "Oh… we seem to have lost Neil there…"

Completetosh: "Hello? Hello!…. Hello?"

Presenter: "Never mind. Well, my prediction is…"

Completetosh: Damn.

Such are the perils of attempting to get all cutting edge on yo’ ass, and be part of a BBC Five Live panel via Skype.

Indeed, most of the panel was there via Skype - Kevin Anderson wasn’t, but I think Suw Charman and Tim Worstall were using it. And I was jolly interested to see how the technology might hold up in that kind of situation. Unfortunately, it was more Nationwide circa 1983 than News 24 circa 2005, but never mind. That it worked at all is some kind of everyday miracle, I suppose.

With a crowd like that gathered, albeit virtually, you blog watchers out there would hazard a guess on we were discussing, and you’d be right. We were discussing the blogging year that was, and looking forward to the year that is.

Everyone else came up with sensible predictions, and managed to sound substantially less curmudgeonly than I did (went on about how I don’t like most of Britain’s political blogs, again. Went on about the unbearable hype around so much citizen journalism, again). But, since this is my blog and I am free to be as curmudgeonly as I like here, I’m going to insist on offering up my three, slightly crap, British blogging predictions for 2006.

Don’t say I didn’t warn you.

1/ Seen from the perspective of the mainstream media, the British blogosphere will be seen less as an alternative to the mainstream, and more as a breeding ground for writing and (later) broadcasting talent that’s then mainstreamed. In other words: we’ll see quite a few bloggers make the move to big media in 2006. Tim, making a similar prediction, suggested Justin McKeating, the blogger behind Chicken Yoghurt, might be a good candidate.

2/ But I’d be willing to be not all of "new" finds (not even a majority?) will be writing about politics or current affairs. Personally, I’ve high hopes in comedy and sport. There’s lots more to discover out there. And I haven’t given up hopes of finally producing Completetosh.com - the stage show.

3/ Finally - and seriously, folks - blogs will come to be seen as sitting at the "full-on" end of a spectrum of participatory media. The most interesting thought and work will continue to be around the other, "not much effort at all" end, of that spectrum. Some clown will insist on calling it all citizen journalism. I’ll probably moan about that.

Happy New Year, everyone.

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