This strikes me as an effort that could just as easily swing towards the brave -- or the reckless.

Verizon has launched a new policy blog called PoliBlog. In the first post, former Congressman and senior Verizon executive Tom Tauke states:

Before I get hit with a blogswarm, I want you to know that we understand that the blogosphere is naturally dubious of a blog with a corporate pedigree. While this may seem a bit counterintuitive, PoliBlog is not intended as a "corporate" blog. Instead, it is our effort to find a place in the universal town square. We are players in the communications and broadband worlds. What we do or don't do has real impact. So we think we should offer our perspectives and positions on issues and subject them to scrutiny, comment, and debate. It's good for us. And it's healthy for the policymaking process.

It's my hope that PoliBlog will be most focused on the emerging issues that policy makers and consumers and businesses must start dealing with now to ensure the future of converged communications and broadband deployment. Those issues include privacy and security, data rights management and intellectual property protection, and access to broadband networks. And there are whole new perspectives and opportunities that the widespread deployment of broadband will bring to other important challenges facing our society, including the delivery of health care, education, and government services. None of these topics are out of bounds on PoliBlog.

Broadband debates can be very intense, and corporate personalities working through these debates often see their positions shift or evolve. Hopefully, Verizon won't penalize bloggers on PoliBlog who lay out a view and then find themselves on the wrong side of corporate policy at some point.

But for now, TWN offers slightly skeptical praise for this initiative -- and encourages Tom Tauke to make sure that the blog remains an "open space" for ideas and debate and just not another flack operation.

-- Steve Clemons