ON APRIL 1, after a long day at the keyboard, Rogers Cadenhead, a Florida software pundit, decided to book half a dozen domain names.

Pope John Paul II was on his deathbed and Mr Cadenhead knew that a papal election was in the offing. Among the six web addresses that he registered for a total cost of $72 (£37) were ClementXV.com and PiusXIII.com, which he redirected to the Workbench blog that he uses to publicise his latest how-to volumes.

He also booked BenedictXVI.com — and his lonely little weblog was flooded by 120,000 visitors in a single day when Joseph Ratzinger chose that as his papal moniker.

Mr Cadenhead denies that he is a cybersquatter but has presented the Vatican with this list of demands if it wants the domain name:

- two nights at the Vatican hotel built for the conclave;
- one of those hats;
- complete absolution, no questions asked, for the third week of March 1987;
- a blurb by the Pope to put on the back of one of Mr Cadenhead’s books;
- world peace.

There has been no reply yet from the Holy See. In the meantime, Mr Cadenhead has redirected the site to an American charity.

Campbell spin-locum

Rogers Cadenhead’s experience reminds me of what I love best about the internet: one cute idea, a few hours’ development and suddenly you’ve got a property.

The biggest hit of the election campaign is the Who Should You Vote For site, which tapped into a vein of voter uncertainty to become the most visited political site within a few days of its creation last week.

It presents the visitor with 23 statements, such as “Smoking should be banned in public places” or “Foxhunting should be made legal again” and asks you to rate them from strongly agree to strongly disagree. Then it tells you which party you should be voting for — usually Green, Lib Dem or UKIP, but only because they have discernibly different policies.

But my favourite has been the Alastair Campbell blog, a beautifully deadpan parody site. Referring to the Who Should You Vote For quiz, “Mr Campbell” describes how he tried it on Tony Blair: “No matter how many times he tried to submit his answers, it kept giving the same response: that he should vote Conservative. New technology not to be trusted and have fired off rather colourful e-mail to owners of site telling them so.”

There is speculation among political hacks as to who is behind this blog. The tone is perfect, the content exquisitely restrained; only the spelling is suspicious — it’s just too good. The consensus was that it had to be an inside job.

So I e-mailed and asked. The reply came: “I’m not a journalist, I’m not a Parliament insider or connected with politics in any way!!” Interesting, although it could be a fiendishly postmodern double-bluff from Britain’s top spin-doctor.

www.whoshouldyouvotefor.com

www.alastair-campbell.blogspot.com

Are you drinking . . . ?

The other political “blogger” to make a name has been Sandra Howard, the former model married to the Conservative leader, who has become the Tories’ not-so-secret weapon.

Surprisingly, Mrs Howard writes her campaign diary herself. She described how she got a “bit knicker-twisted” when asked on a TV show if her husband liked cracking open a can of lager when he’s watching the soccer. “ ‘Um, he does like beer,’ I say, instead of just admitting he’d more probably stick to a half-time cuppa.”

www.conservatives.com

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