LAS VEGAS — Fans of the popular liberal website Daily Kos gathered here this weekend for an irreverent and impassioned conference that blended elements of a political convention, a revival meeting and what one attendee called a "summer camp reunion for people who have never met each other."
The four-day event, which drew 1,000 people, may have marked a milestone in the evolution of the online liberal community from scruffy insurgents to an institutionalized force within the Democratic Party.
A procession of prominent Democrats appeared at the convention, testifying to the importance that the party now places on cultivating the online activists and bloggers who often describe themselves as the "netroots."
The conference heard from, among others, Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.), Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean, Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) and four possible 2008 presidential candidates, including former Virginia Gov. Mark R. Warner.
Yet the weekend offered plenty of evidence that the netroots will be difficult for Democrats to domesticate.
The bloggers and liberal activists who filled the panels and workshops condemned the Washington Democratic establishment almost as enthusiastically as they did the Republican Party, President Bush and the mainstream media.
In a keynote address Thursday night, Markos Moulitsas Zuniga, who founded Daily Kos in 2002 after serving a stint in the Army, portrayed the rise of Internet activism as a challenge to both political parties, the media, and all the other established institutions in the political system.
"The media elite has failed us; the political elite, both parties, has failed us -- Republicans have failed us because they can't govern; Democrats have failed us because they can't get elected," Moulitsas said. "So now it's our turn."
The political impact of netroots activism remains a subject of debate.
Dean was the online community's favorite Democratic presidential candidate in 2004, and he won only a single primary. But since then, Democrats have grown more reliant on the Internet to raise money and get out their message.
Almost all Democrats agree that the Internet activists who are linked through institutions like Daily Kos and other liberal websites -- including MyDD and the giant advocacy group MoveOn.org -- wield increasing influence in the party.
