Arianna: no ghost writers

One of the assumptions skeptics seem to have made about the Huffington Post is that the celebrity contributors will, inevitably, use their assistants, advisers and agents to polish or even write the posts for the group blog. But in a Q-and-A with Mark Glaser in USC's Online Journalism Review, Huffington says otherwise.

That will never happen. They will never bother to do that, it's not of any interest to them. The majority of the people are people who are on e-mail a lot, they IM their friends. What we're asking them to do is basically tell us the thoughts they're already having, the conversations they're already having, the takes they're already having.

Now some of them who don't use a computer like Arthur Schlesinger might fax it. I personally don't have a problem with that. I'd rather have Arthur Schlesinger online, his own voice, his own thoughts, than say, 'You know what, you have to learn how to use our software, we can't have you on.' I'm sure there are some purists who think that, no, you should actually use the blogging software, you should use Movable Type. But I don't have a problem with Arthur Schlesinger faxing me his thoughts, or someone calling from his cell phone and dictating something, but it has to be his thoughts -- that has to be unequivocal.

The Huffington Post is scheduled to launch next Monday, May 9. The group blog entries will run down the left side of the main page, while news headlines-links chosen by ex-Drudge Report feeder Andrew Breitbart will be on the right side. No ads or reader comments at first, Huffington tells Glaser. The OJR story talks about her plans for the website and lists some of the principals and name contributors.