The Washington Post is to use a reality TV-style talent contest to find its next columnist.
The competition, America's Next Great Pundit, promises all the all the elements of such television shows: elimination rounds, text and email voting, and catty comments by judges.
The respected US newspaper's rivals have sneered at the idea, and see it as a desperate attempt to reverse dwindling sales. The New York Times calls it the American Idol for the George Will set, referring to one of the Post's conservative columnists.
It has also been derided by US bloggers. "Ha, ha, ha ... the internet is beating them to it," scoffs Kos, "Gather your most contradictory and inherently untenable positions on torture, foreign policy, healthcare, etc, etc," teased the Washington gossip blog Wonkette. While Gawker turns to withering sarcasm.
But blogger and commentator Chris Weigant applauded the Post's attempts to open to the masses its ivory tower of "old, stale syndicated op-ed columnists".
In his own entry to the competition, which he shared with readers of the Huffington Post, Weigant blasts the failure of newspapers to represent the explosion of opinions out there.
The winner of the Washington Post's competition will receive $2,600 (£1,600) prize money and a 13-week stint at the paper, being paid $200 a column. Here at the Guardian, Comment is Free.
