The Spectator, redux

Andy Carpark

'more people are reading us than ever before'

Mugs.

Johnny T

Glad to hear it - I never bought the magazine (too expensive), but subscribe on my Kindle where the price is right.

Peter Jacobs

I have two subscriptions, one magazine one Kindle. But no cartoons on the Kindle - that needs to change! Half the fun of the speccie is the rude cartoons.

Opusdeath

Fraser, that's great news. I found the Spectator through the Coffee House blogs. I'd always been aware of it but never interacted with it until I picked up the interesting posts through Twitter.
In terms of the new Coffee House, please keep the simple style, I'm here to read the text.
And please keep up with the graphs, I love a Fraser Nelson post with graphs :)
Well done to you and all the team there.

PayDirt

Not all bad: with England's cricket team resurgent, the country if not the world is set for a rebound for sure.

Isabel

Good to see you cut out that luxury and style fluff that used to pad out the magazine. Surprised that Taki's views still have a place in your 21st century Speccie

James W

Love what you guys do on Coffee House - still the best group blog in UK politics (and by some distance).

partisanmarzipan

Well done the Spectator. I have loved your magazine for many years now, the quality of your writing is uniquely uplifting. And this is coming from a left-wing Guardian-reading German. I admire the acute political analysis as much as the meandering musings of eg Paul Johnson, the diary as much as the brilliant advice of dear Mary (is it a spoof? Isn't it? Are these the kinds of problem a typical Spectator comes up against?!). I will even read Rod Liddle, in triumphant, self-righteous outrage at his undeniable obsession with race. Alex Massie is great, James Forsyth good on Europe (I'm a massive europhile, but still...) Theodore Dalrymple is a nutjob, Taki is weird but both are no less readable for that. I read all of it anyway, every week, every tiny bit and I make others read you too.I almost never agree with any of your politics, but you do write so damn well. So I hope you'll keep on going forever. Well done, Spectator. PS you could close the comments on your blogs, they often make me throw up my lunch. You seem to attract some of the the more rabid, more (!) evil-spirited of the Daily Mail contingency. But maybe I'm just overly intolerant...

Publius

Do you agree with Rod Liddle (and me) that The Spectator has a natural upper limit of sales before quality suffers?

PayDirt

Isabel on Taki: I'm forever grateful to Taki years ago for alerting me to the works of Mayne Reid. They are now available free on Kindle. Some of the best adventure stories ever (maybe for the boys though).

Tulkinghorn

Suggestion for new Coffee House?

Instant on line publication of posts to facilitate dialogue. You can always remove, warn and bar miscreants

Magnolia

We subscribe to the Kindle version.
Yes I miss the pictures but we get the full magazine for far less cost.
It's worth subscribing because the content is still different to CH unlike with the DT, where we stopped subscribing, because we'd read all the same stuff on the internet.
We still buy a newspaper but not every day and not always the same one.
The Kindle is my spouse's new techy toy and they just love all the cheaper books and maggies that they can now read without all that recycling or bags of books for charity shops that clutter up the house.

Hugo Chav

Congrats on surviving and thriving :-)

In the refreshed Coffee House could you make it easy to post a comment like on Alphaville?

Could you do an Alphaville "Markets Live" on PMQs?

If someone posts a link in a comment could you make it live so that one can click and go direct, rather than the current copy and paste.

A big thank you to all the Coffee Housers!

Publius

I also subscribe, by the way. I always prefer books and magazines to computer screens.

Does that qualify me to criticise? If so, then next time Prescott gives you some lip, give him a punch in the gob. That will get you in the headlines.

Rhoda Klapp

Sincere congratulations on the sales increase.

for the CH? Well, I think a right-wing blogger, of course. Better bloggers in general, with more willingness to interact, because online is not print. A channel for civilians to post occasional blog entries, subject to editorial selection of course. Finally, another distinction between print practice and online is the way stories here die as soon as they get pushed off page one. Sort by comment activity, not time posted. New posts come in at the top, but old busy posts can stay as long as they are active. And don't become too popular.

Peter From Maidstone

You say..

When you include our blogs, the number of Spectator readers has never been higher.

If this is so then surely your readers have been higher than they are at present because a great many of those who post here (obviously I don't know the analysis of hits on your site) don't read the Spectator in print or online. I don't for one - although I used to read it every week.

If you haven't addressed the issue of why committed conservatives such as post here don't want to read the Spectator at present then I fear that you are fooling yourself that things are looking up.

Your most effusive compliment in the thread above is from a Guardian reader. I think that should tell you something.

With the possibility of Kindle and other e-print distribution I would say that the Spectator is at greater risk than ever before since all that is required to bring a monthly or fortnightly publication to e-press is some interesting contributors with a conservative point of view.

Such a competitor is surely not beyond the realms of possibility. Indeed there are now Standpoint and the Salisbury Review who produce much more consistently conservative articles.

But if you return to the conservatism you are supposed to espouse then I'd consider becoming a subscriber again. At the moment although I sometimes pick up a print copy in Smiths I put it down again after glancing through it.

Ed P

As Private Eye might say, "Long may your organ flourish"

McBoo

I havent noticed much in the way of design changes at the magazine but I have enjoyed the writing of Messers Liddle and Cohen, two fearless men of the left who fit right in at the Spectator.

Given the amount of stick you get over Taki I'm guessing he remains a matinee idol in the Shires. (We all know he's awful, go on, give him the heave-ho, you can have my money on direct debit if you do)

Fraser Nelson

Publius: my view is simple: that The Spectator's values are as relevant to the 21st century as they were to the 18th. If we respect the intelligence of our readers, we'll prosper. It's the best-written magazine in the English language, and our digital platforms allow us to reach a far greater chunk of the English-speaking world. So I'm very optimistic. I firmly believe that the market for a magazine of The Spectator's quality is far bigger than our current circulation.

Austin Barry

Partisanmarzipan@1:10pm

"PS you could close the comments on your blogs, they often make me throw up my lunch. You seem to attract some of the the more rabid, more (!) evil-spirited of the Daily Mail contingency."

I quite agree.

The Coffeehouse comment sections, particularly the Wall, seem to be a marshalling yard for the unhinged: the provenance of geriatric, urine and whisky-soaked racists and nay-sayers whose mean-spirited, vomitus remarks are a despicable legacy from an ‘Old’ England frozen in those evil ‘whites only’ Ealing and sexist Carry On ‘comedies’ or paedophile films where elderly, train-borne ‘gentlemen’ travel backwards and forwards across Yorkshire looking for victims. Well, Ealing and Yorkshire are now places of multi-cultural vibrancy and much the better for it.

Particularly offensive are the comments of a ‘Frank P.’ apparently a former policeman given to nihilistic comments festooned in appallingly bad language and often featuring brutal sexual imagery. His recent comments on buggery and bestiality particularly offended me as many of my friends are dog-loving members of the gay community where ‘give a dog a bone’ means just exactly that.

Equally offensive are the ravings of a certain ‘Verity’ who has apparently decamped from some secure accommodation in England and is now spitting unhelpful, Tequila-suffused bile from Mexico. Verity contra mundum. Hardly part of the Big Society. Mexico? Keep walking in zig-zags, love.

Otherwise, the Speccie blogs are a marvellous place to troll.

oldtimer

I think that you need to consider an Android version to go alongside the Kindle and the Ipad versions, otherwise you will miss a growing segment of the tablet market. The recently released Android v3.2 is adapted for tablets and is suitable for the magazine format.

We have subscribed to the Telegraph for the past two or three years but will not renew on expiry. All our news will be obtained on line or on air - but mostly online via an Android tablet. The big benefit of online browsing is the ability it offers to go back to the source documents (in pdf) rather tha just rely on the intermediary. The Coffehouse blog is very useful in this respect because it often links to such sources. This is a big plus for online vs print media.

libertarian

Congratulations on bucking the trend in media. If you also signed up with civicboom.com you could vastly improve your digital audience engagement too.

Mil

This is good news and shows the way forward for many editorial products. But I think it's only possible to go the digital way if the content is engaging and quirky. And adds value to the whole British intellectual landscape. Not every magazine or newspaper can claim that, but the open web, which is your most direct competitor, can - and has accustomed us to such virtues.

I'm not a right-winger, but do find your content interesting. I've been subscribing to the Guardian Kindle edition this summer and the reading experience is far better than web. So you never know - you may shortly see me subscribing to the Spectator too!

William

I would never buy an iPad or Kindle or any other e-version. The day it stops being printed is the day I cancel my sub. You have been warned!

I'm pleased to hear The Spectator is in good health as is my other magazine subscription, Private Eye. I don't think it's coincidence that both yourselves and the Eye do not release content online - or at least not all of it. The CH is a good way to lure potential readers in without giving away the magazine which funds the writing in the first place. How newspapers thought they could give away free content online and then still sell the same content at the stand is beyond me.

Peter from Maidstone, the market has already spoken and The Spectator's popularity is proof that management have taken the correct decisions.

kb

Suggestions for the mag: allow paid access to the full contents of the magazine on a one-off basis (via web/pdf), i.e. the digital equivalent of newsagent sales.

For CH: threaded comments; instant posting; allow other readers to curb abuse with an 'abuse' button (it's the market way).

Frank P

Austin Barry (2.20pm)

Priceless! Satire par excellence. If I were never to read another 'comment', that one would suffice anyway and take me gurgling happily into the hereafter in the knowledge that there is a God after all and He speaks to us through the words of his right hand man - an apostate lawyer in exile in the Emerald Isle. The Second Coming indeed! Fraser, do you never feel humbled by your punters?

Peter From Maidstone

William, it may well be that a soft-left-left leaning magazine will succeed with a soft-left-leaning readership. It is noteworthy that many of the readers identifying themselves above are also Guardian readers.

The Spectator, as a business, can choose to adopt that audience as its target. But if it wishes to be a conservative publication then it should survey those who have been regular readers and have stopped being so. It should also take account of the constant criticism on the CH. People make such criticism because they want the Spectator to succeed. But not at any price. Certainly not at the price of becoming a soft-left liberal publication and website.

I read almost every blog post and comment here everyday. I am certainly not disengaged and certainly wish the Spectator well. But I read Standpoint and the Salisbury Review because they present a conservative perspective and address the issues of the day from a conservative, or at least from an interesting, point of view.

StephenW

I second kb's suggestions for CH. Being able to click "recommend" (or similar) would also be nice for those too busy to post a reply.

Publius

William (2.20) writes: "the market has already spoken and The Spectator's popularity is proof that management have taken the correct decisions."

Not at all sure that this follows. It sounds rather too philistine to me.

The Sun's sales are higher than The Spectator. Does that make the Sun better?

Are Mr Nelson and his masters prepared to pursue higher sales at any price? If not, what is the price?

normanc

Congratulations and I agree with oldtimer at 2.08pm - get an Android app out. It can't be that difficult to either port the iOS app or rewrite a new one that just churns the same content out in Android friendly output.

Google do fail sometimes but mainly on social issues, never on engineering so I hold out great hopes for the droid.

Steve Tierney

I buy the Spectator because it delivers what I want. Right-of-center common sense and (mostly) sound conservative articles.

For a whiel the magazine seemed on a path to bland centrism and I very nearly cancelled my sub. Glad I didn't - and glad you changed track.

Just as a personal observation - I could live without the reviews section easily. I could live without High Life and Low Life etc - I find them dull columns. It's the articles I buy the magazine for - Toby and James and the like.

I used to buy half a dozen magazines but they've all declined in quality and now Spectator is pretty much ALL I buy. From a personal point of view only I'd suggest that it is the political articles which make the mag. There's always plenty of quality ones to read.

Publius

@StephenW
"Being able to click "recommend" (or similar) would also be nice for those too busy to post a reply."

Tell you what. If you're too busy, don't respond at all. Much better, don't you think?

Catherine Kraina

Been a subscriber for quite a while. The magazine continues to deliver value, but proofreading has slipped, a major irritant. Also the odd pagination glitch, where the last line of an item disappears, is a bit of a bummer. Not quite reconciled to the Australian content, which is a tad short on quality quite often.

Charles

PfM:

"But if it wishes to be a conservative publication then it should survey those who have been regular readers and have stopped being so."

It's interesting, though, how the definition of "conservative" shifts over time. The party has always been one of the centre/centre-right from the time when Peel founded it out of the Liberal and Tory parties.

I would imagine that the Ultras of Addison's time had views that were too astringent even for you?

Charlie the Chump

What about an App for BlackBerry Playbook?

partisanmarzipan

@Peter from Maidstone, just to clarify, I don't read the spectator because it's a soft-left-leaning magazine, quite the opposite. I disagree with almost all of its editorial line, but that to me is the joy of it. Having your own views confirmed at all times is dull & unchallenging. Did I mention that I am a feminist, too? I can be all that, liberal, soft & squishy, bleeding-heart, Guardian-reading, and STILL appreciate quality writing and quality reasoning. And the bloody typos in the Grauniad get on my nerves.

Derek Pasquill

More posts please about the inability of liberal intellectuals, including those at the Spectator and Coffeehouse, to discuss aggressive Islam and its impact on Europe.

Andy Carpark

Partisanmarzipan
August 18th, 2011 1:10pm

What a joy to hear that some of our comments make you chunder through your nose. While not wishing to be stereotypic, I can feel and rejoice in your discomfort in the event that said expectorations include shreds of your national dish of sauerkraut.

And if you care to wander over to our quaint li'l old 'Coffee Housers' Wall' linked top left, you will find a brazenly emetic comment at 17 August 2011 10:22 am which graphically portrays your beloved Chancellor in ecstatic sexual congress with an Alsatian dog.

Strike me pink if that won't have you spending the whole night spewing into a bucket.

partisanmarzipan

Andy Carpark, what, that tame little fantasy is meant to induce an attack of the vomit? Who hasn't imagined la Merkel in such a position. Well, I haven't, but to each their own. I prefer imagining YOUR chancellor the right revolting weasly Osborne drowning in a bucket of drool. The comments that get my gag reflexes going are those that lack the decency of using proper punctuation, that are grammatically unaesthetic... or those that try too hard. Oh, that would be yours.

Jupiter

Bring back Mark Steyn.

Andy Carpark

As your brattish little retort proves conclusively, I did not have to try very hard at all. Over and out.

Frank P

partisanmarzipan (4.53pm)

Piss poor riposte, verdammte Schweinehund. Give up! You've been bested - twice. And if that's badly translated or punctuated, harten shit!

Warren Valentine

I beg of you to ignore Peter from Maidstone, if you wish for the Spectator's current success to continue and grow. I speak from a young audience and I very much guess that he does not... After all, I'm going to be around longer (hopefully) so you need to be courting me and my ilk!

The Spectator *must* not pander to these arcane distinctions of we need "conservative" of "right-wing" bloggers. This is not what I think the Spectator is about at the moment and long may this continue. It is frightening that Peter from Maidstone is horrified that a Guardian reader is commenting.

I read the spectator, and your new and burgeoning audience do not read the Spectator because its "conservative." I do not think, spectator = conservative = good. Please stick with this new mantra you seem to use Fraser Nelson, that the Coffee House is for those with something interesting to say. We do not live and learn by isolating ourselves with right-wing bloggers, but informative comment that is original, different, well-sourced and linked. Wherever such comment may fit on the political spectrum is an irrelevance. I read the Coffee House because it broadens my horizons "Peter from Maidstone." I don't want to read/purchase a publication, because its conservative, and thus I can swallow everything in it whole, safe in the knowledge it is the view point that I should have. The Coffee House is a place for debate, and this should include the bloggers themselves and would be greatly aided by 'live comment' to echo some of the comments above. Please do not aim the Coffee House anywhere politically, but keep it an open forum for any interesting view, where readers can come, read, deliberate and then comment to support, challenge or nuance the view presented... This is where the Spectator should be heading, this is what the young political class want.

Clive G

I have a physical impairment which makes turning pages in paper based publications a tiresome chore. I switched to the digital Speccie after purchasing a Kindle and have since discovered Taki and Jeremy Clarke whose columns where always inconveniently located in the paper edition.

The two main downsides about the Kindle edition are the lack of cartoons and the frequent omission of the blurb about the contributors that usually follows articles in the print version.

Peter From Maidstone

Warren Valentine, you sound just like a Spectator employee who has been told to create a nom deplume and post in support of the Spectator. I assume that you are.

Peter From Maidstone

... and who the hell cares what the 'young political class' thinks. What gives you the right to think you are part of any sort of class at all?! 'Political class'! They should all be shot.

Publius

@Warren Valentine 5.50pm
"I speak from a young audience and I very much guess that he does not... After all, I'm going to be around longer (hopefully) so you need to be courting me and my ilk!"

-- 'Tommorrow belongs to me'?

Guy

you should structure coffee house blogs so the full article appears in google reader or readability. That is how I (and I assume thousands of others) read your blogs. Having to click through to the coffee house website is a bit of a pain for every blog post

TGF UKIP

You'll forgive me,Fraser, but you're an economist and your facility with statistics and your permanent proximity to spin make me a little wary of your circulation claims. If true then as one who has not been averse to pulling your plonker in the past, I am humbled and owe you an apology as well as congratulations.

I do still get the mag which I read only selectively and I am obviously a visitor on here albeit an infrequently less frequent one. Indeed, I think the CH has become a case where less could be more. I recently became increasingly wary of spending too much time on here so many posts were there by your hacks.

The trouble is that as the comments are usually at least as informative and thought provoking as the original hack posts and reading them all can be pretty time consuming, it's a damn sight too easy to be diverted for too long from the rest of life. And this as one who never goes near The Wall and very rarely near any of your auxiliaries now Mel Philips has gone (may as well go to The Guardian Blog.)

To me at least though, what the mag lacks is a regular, authentic and acerbic conservative voice which will, by definition, be anti this One Nation, LibDem government. Bit difficult for the Speccie I know as Cameron Tory house mag, but then you might at least evade some of the accusations of cheerleading.

What would be especially welcome though on here, would be some humour especially as all you lot come across as such a serious, earnest young bunch. Cartoons would help as would be some whimsy a la Tamzin or you could just set Frank P free - at least that would lighten Austin Barry's day as well as mine.

Anna

Well good for you, I'm delighted for you!

Sadly I was obliged to rescind my subscription in the interests of saving any little bit I can so I can part-pay the 'green' increases on my utility bills. The rest of those payments comes from reducing my utility usage... shivering through winters, indoors, clad in fur boots and multiple jumpers, living as far as possible on cold food that I don't have to cook, although I do go wild occasionally and boil an egg!

If you think the politicians are out of touch with how a lot of people have to live, you're right, but I think most of you pundits are equally out of touch.

disgusted of LG

Frank P - you are a nasty, shameful piece of work. Your comment is a disgrace but no doubt your children are proud of their papa's ignorance.

Derek

Derek Pasquill

...and of the inability of Mr. Nelson to keep his promise to write on Neathergate.

****

Bring back Paul Johnson, Mark Steyn and Melanie Philipps and announce a drive to raise funds to allow Warren Valentine to complete her A Level English studies.

Frank P

"Your comment is a disgrace"

Quite effective though, apparently? All my comments are designed to be disgraceful and my children know that pride cometh before a fall.

David H

In view of Dot Wordsworth's subject matter and new location (and dare I say her name) shouldn't her column be renamed 'The last word'?

andrew

i love the mag and coffeehouse. is coffeehouse the right name for such an important blog though?

you shape the debate, and inform Westminster, the uk and the USA public. is branding at its best with such a formal mag name yet informal blog name?

perhaps you should make the message more uniform when you relaunch it. dare I suggest 'spec online' or maybe 'spectator discuss' or, well, I'll stop now.

FRAZER NELSON: I've often said on coffeehouse comments that for all he did to harm The UK, Gordon Brown should be tried for treason. you are his opposite, for all you do shaping the debate, you should be knighted or made duke of scotland or some other form of recognition. I for one am very grateful to have you out there limiting damage and pointing out to them their folly before it's too late to change their minds. thank you!!!! :)

partisanmarzipan

Frank P - I thought your comment directed at me was very funny! And you're right, mine *was* a piss poor riposte, I shouldn't even have tried. Sincerely, "Schweinehund" (actually: Schweinebitch!)

pjh3121

I can't understand why there are two apps for the iPhone. One with what looks like a PDF of the magazine, and the other Coffee House one with the blogs. I hope the new app Fraser talks about will merge the two.

Warren Valentine

Peter from Maidstone, I am not in any sort of employment with the spectator and would be happy to authenticate myself; and Derek, I'm not adverse to receiving any funds you wish to see channelled my way.

As a woman with apparently a 'males's name' perhaps I could take you along to this place where I'm alledgedly studing A Level English Lit. My confused nomenclature might expand your horizons a bit, and we can educate you to rebuff an argument rather than to make such hideously simple personal gibes.

TGF UKIP

Fraser, I take back all I said about you lot being a humourless, po-faced bunch. Clearly to put a headline on the cover of the house mag like this week's, takes a Doddian sense of humour.

Frank P

Schweinebitch (9.57am)

In that case, I fear my comment was indeed very ungallant and I apologise unreservedly. There are other ladies with a fine sense of humour scribbling on this wall and I do try not to offend the fair sex. Except 'Patricia Shaw' of course, whom we discovered in the course of events was a joint pen name for conglomerate of multi-sexual leftist-Arabist interests. That little team now appears to have given up the ghost, as far as its agitprop assignment on this blog was concerned. Or maybe they are giving Glenn Beck a bad time in Israel and will eventually return to give us grist for the mill again here.

Stick around! You'll grow to love the rough trade here eventually – often rude but always right (in all senses of that word).

In fact most of the trolls on this blog seem to have been positively affected by constant exposure to the crew here, rather than vice versa. A bit like the Oxford don who took a job in a Secondary Modern in 'ackney in order to teach the scrotes correctly enunciated Queen's English and finished up returning to the dreaming spires with a Mockney accent laced with Wet Indian patois. Osmosis can be an unpredictable phenomenon.

Good luck! And thank you for your understanding (I hope?). Watch out for that Andy Car Park, though, particularly his placards, when he does his rounds in Piccadilly: they contain questions which often are not easily answered without deep probing research into places where the sun rarely shines.

One last thing, before I leave you to your sauerkraut and retching: despite what your forebears did to my childhood (which, as you read my posts, you will realise was probably irreparable damage) I have good reasons to admire the modern Gerry and his methodical energy. Moreover, I had a great time in Austria during my military service there, in the early Fifties before we gave it back. Our little secret Unit was patrolled between two 12 foot wire fences by dog-handling POWs from the German army - lovely chaps who didn't like Hitler any more than I did. As far as I know none of them had relationships with their Alsatian guard dogs that were anything other than both professional and Platonic, despite ACPs fantasies about your current leader.

I have to say some of those Austrian Hofstatters in Lederhosen were a bit strange, though. "Servus Du", Indeed!

Oommpahh! Oommpah! "Was ist los in der garden heuter abend?" ..... altogether now.

"Heute abend, heute abend ... was ist los ..." Lala, lala lala, lala lala!

That’s probably on You Tube if you were to look for it. It was seared into my soul by a combination of Deutsche lager and the smell of Garlic.

In fact the memory of it drove my muse to versifying some time ago in a wistful reverie:

A dream of Austria 1952

Oesterreich O Oesterreich
Mein snow capped, garlic-reeking dream.
Memories in scwartz und weiss:
The pidgin Deutsch of sweet nineteen.

Thalerhof bei Graz in Steiermark:
Plateua plain ‘twixt rugged peaks.
Zwei sschilling fur ein bier in Feldbach.
Oh God above, how garlic reeks.

Summer evenings bei das Uhrturm,
Trysting khaki filled with lust.
Turkish cigarettes in Autumn
‘Neath Beethoven’s bronzéd bust.

Sulphurous fumes of anthracite;
Gendarmerie in Prussian Blue;
The graceful lilting glider’s flight
Where once the Luftwaffe Junkers flew.

At Thalerhof one winter’s night
On full moon snow at three ay emm:
A football game, in perfect light,
Which ended in complete mayhem.

Oh, callow youth on NAAFI beer
No mercy grants, no quarter seeks;
Brooks no defeat and feel no fear.
O God above, how garlic reeks.

Through sultry summer’s balmy breeze
Mit tasche voll auf BAAFVS und baccy
In KD shorts and bulled puttees,
Off to Graz with Scouse and Blackie

Where beeline made to Palmer’s store
Anticipating Blighty’s shore:
For gifts to gladden love one’s heart
To compensate for months apart.

The beauty of those rugged tors;
Giant, jagged Tyrolean peaks.
Why did I yearn for white-cliffed shores?
O God above, how garlic reeks!

Archibald

Firstly, I've enjoyed the last couple weeks of the Speccy very much indeed.

Secondly, I've said this elsewhere, but as I've been away I missed this. CH was starting to fade a bit, so good news you're looking to refresh. Rod's back, which is nice, but in an ideal world I'd like you to add a few others to the list, my main suggestions being:
1. Starkey - I suggested this before recent news. Or another big name academic or two for a different perspective on current issues.
2. Douglas Murray
3. A.N. Economist - either big city name or top academic to blog on the economy (à la Krugman for the NT Times). Perhaps that Hugh Hendry chap. He's always good for a story.
4. Guest bloggers on rotation perhaps
5. I'm not religious myself, but a top dog from the C of E would no doubt have interesting things to say, and I'm sure they'd love a slot. Maybe even the forces' padre. That might be fun.
6. Blue Labour creator Maurice Glasman I'm sure would have plenty to say - here would be an interesting place for him to say it.

There you go. Six of the best.