Matt Drudge

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Matt Drudge

Matthew Drudge (born October 27, 1966) is an American Internet personality and talk radio host. He is best known as the proprietor of the Drudge Report website, which made national waves when it was the first to break the news of a relationship between "a White House intern" and President Bill Clinton (the Monica Lewinsky scandal) in 1998.

Early years

Drudge was relatively unknown before he began his Report and made national headlines. He was raised in Takoma Park, Maryland, near Washington, DC, where he was reportedly a "loner" and a news junkie. He graduated from Northwood High School in 1984. He said, "The only good grades I got in school were for current events." At an early age, he worked delivering papers for the Washington Star and spent much time reading the paper.

For many years, Drudge took a number of odd jobs such as night counterman at a 7-Eleven convenience store, a Time/Life books phone salesman, and sales assistant at a New York City grocery store. In 1989, he moved to Los Angeles where he took up residence in a small Hollywood apartment. He took a job in the gift shop of CBS studios, eventually working his way up to manager. It is here that he was apparently privy to some inside gossip, part of the inspiration for founding the Drudge Report. The original issues of the Drudge Report was equal part gossip and opinion. They were distributed as an e-mail newsletter and posted to alt.showbiz.gossip Usenet forum where they were equally loved and ridiculed. In 1996, the newsletter transitioned slowly from entertainment gossip to political gossip and moved from e-mail to the WWW as its primary distribution mechanism.

Rise in stature

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The Drudge Report website

Drudge's website gained in popularity in the late 1990s after a series of reports in which he beat the mainstream media by reporting first. Drudge first received national attention in 1996 when he broke the news that Jack Kemp would be Republican Bob Dole's running mate in the 1996 presidential election. In 1998, Drudge gained notoriety when he was the first outlet to break the news which later became the Monica Lewinsky scandal. Today, his site receives millions of page views per day and continues to grow. In updating the site, he reportedly monitors multiple television news channels and a number of websites on several computers in his home office.

A story by Business 2.0 magazine from April 2003 estimated that Drudge's website pulled in $3,500 a day in advertising revenues. Combined with his radio show and subtracting his relatively minor server costs, the magazine estimated that Drudge pulled in $800,000 a year with his simple website. An article in The Miami Herald from September 2003 said Drudge estimated he earns $1.2 million a year from his website and radio show. During an April 30, 2004 appearance on C-SPAN, Drudge confirmed that he has broken the seven-figure mark.

For many years, Drudge was based out of his apartment in Hollywood. Today, Drudge maintains the website from his condominium in Miami, Florida. Drudge moved to Florida in part because that state has no income tax, and Drudge's enterprise was becoming increasingly profitable. [1]

Drudge hosts a weekly Sunday night talk radio show—"The only time anyone will let me on the air," he claims. The show, which he also styles the "Drudge Report", is syndicated by Premiere Radio Networks. Drudge hosted a short-lived Saturday night television show on the Fox News Channel starting in June 1998. The show ended abruptly in November 1999 when the two parties mutually agreed to part ways. Drudge had refused to go on air, charging Fox News with censorship when the network prevented him from showing photos of surgery on a fetus (not related to abortion, though Drudge is staunchly Pro-Life). Fox News charged him with breach of contract, but the two amicably parted ways. His contract was originally set to run through February 2001. [2]

Drudge also wrote a book in 2000 titled Drudge Manifesto. (ISBN 0451201507)

Matt Drudge also guest hosted for Rush Limbaugh while Limbaugh was in rehabilitation for a drug addiction.

In 2006, TIME Magazine named Drudge one of the 100 most influential people in the world. [3]

Persona and criticism

Drudge frequently champions himself as an independent populist, free from the influences of corporations, advertisers and editors.

When his site reached the one billion page view mark during 2002, Drudge summarized his activities in these broad terms: "In every state and nearly every civilized nation in the developed world, readers know where to go for action and reaction of news -- at least one day ahead... Free from any corporate concerns, there are simply too many to thank since the site's inception in 1994. This new attempt at the old American experiment of full freedom in reporting is ever exciting. Those in power have everything to lose by individuals who march to their own rules." [4]

However, critics regard Drudge's contribution to journalism as questionable, saying that the only stories he actually breaks are completely conceived, researched, funded, and written by other reporters. A federal judge noted in a judgment on a libel lawsuit, which ended in Drudge's favor, that Drudge was not a "reporter, a journalist, or a newsgatherer." Drudge's most famous achievement, the breaking of the Monica Lewinsky story, offended editors because by publishing details of the story, Drudge essentially made an editorial decision that overrode Newsweek's (which was sitting on the story).

To many, Drudge's politics are considered to be unabashedly conservative; however, Drudge has repeatedly attempted to distance himself from establishment conservatives, arguing that his politics more accurately reflect libertarianism. In addition, the libertarian Individual Rights Foundation paid for his attorney's fees in the Blumenthall lawsuit and he has substituted for Rush Limbaugh on his radio show. Nonetheless, a UCLA political scientist published a study of media bias in December 2005 which actually found that the Drudge Report leans "left of center."[5] Drudge shows a fondness for apolitical stories heavy on news drama (the path of an oncoming hurricane) or the tabloid-bizarre (the birth of an exceptionally heavy baby), or, curiously, events in Las Vegas, Nevada.

Another topic of interest has been Drudge's repeated publishing of personal attacks, suggestions, and private information, such as the Monica Lewinsky and Sidney Blumenthal reports. In contrast to this, there have been repeated media reports that Matt Drudge is gay, beginning with an article published in the online magazine Salon.com. Subsequent articles were reported by the New Times newsweekly chain, the Boston Phoenix and others. Former conservative reporter David Brock has discussed his personal connections with Matt Drudge's gay life in his book Blinded by the Right. Drudge has denied that he is gay.

Drudge has been criticized as reckless or careless for publishing erroneous reports. The most famous was a libel lawsuit stemming from a 1997 report in which he said that incoming White House assistant Sidney Blumenthal beat his wife and was covering it up. Drudge retracted the story the next day, saying he was given bad information, but Blumenthal filed a $30 million libel lawsuit against Drudge. Blumenthal dropped his lawsuit after agreeing to a settlement which required Blumenthal to pay cash to Drudge's attorneys.

"This frivolous lawsuit, which was approved by a sitting president and vice president of the United States, comes to its wimpy conclusion with Mr. Blumenthal, I repeat, Mr. Blumenthal cutting a check," Drudge said at the time. "In return, I pay him nothing, and have agreed not to countersue."

Drudge's opinion on blogs has also been very hostile, causing numerous "Drudge-like" websites to appear, with the use of blogs as a part of their function, with a columnar format.

Drudge has been variously called "an idiot with a modem" by Keith Olbermann, "the country's reigning mischief-maker" by The New York Times and "the kind of bold, entrepreneurial, free-wheeling, information-oriented outsider we need far more of in this country," by Camille Paglia. [6] Drudge has promoted articles by Camille Paglia despite the fact that she is far to the left of him.

Small Business Computing showed "rising star" Soledad O'Brien pictured with Drudge Report on her computer screen. [7]

External links

• Drudge Report
• Notable Names Database Profile
• Biography from Speakers Platform
• Another biography
• Matt Drudge's political donations**Disputed by Matt Drudge
• Anyone With A Modem Can Report On The World Transcript of Matt Drudge's 1998 Address Before the National Press Club
• Matt Drudge at the Internet Movie Database

Positive

• Linking news sites, Matt Drudge creates an Internet success, by Richard Pachter, The Miami Herald, September 1, 2003

Criticism

• Spreading Drudge's Sludge By Michelangelo Signorile
• Media Matters reports on Matt Drudge