Vice is virtual for the online inclined

\o7LIBERAL \f7bloggers proved at least one thing during the YearlyKos convention in Las Vegas last week: They can handle the city's Friday night challenge. I've covered plenty of conventions here -- gatherings of skeptics, libertarians, abstinence activists, adult entertainers, jugglers and young Republicans -- and I've noticed that, on Friday nights, they experience a substantial drift toward the entertainments of Sin City, making for a slow start to Saturday morning's business.

Yet, most of the more than 1,000 progressive bloggers gathered June 8 to 11 at the Riviera were present when Democratic party leader Howard Dean stepped to the podium at 8 a.m. Saturday to address YearlyKos (the name comes from the popular website Daily Kos). The attendees packed the tables in the convention room, laptops open, and filled the rows of chairs in the back. They were all business. No one wanted to fritter away what the progressive blogosphere considered a watershed event -- its first gathering out here in the real world.

People have the impression of a blogger as "someone sitting in their pajamas at a computer with no social skills, who has no desire to leave their house and orders everything from takeout," said Shanna Ingalsbee, 43, who works for a business-management firm in L.A. by day, and served as the convention's volunteer coordinator. "But in reality, that is not the case. A function like this dispels that myth."

Well, maybe to a degree. Sure, they were out of their houses, but plenty of them didn't leave the Riviera. In fact, they seemed much more interested in one another than in even the big-name speakers eager to court them (Dean, Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid) or, especially, the host city. "I think we are interacting more with each other inside the hotel than we are with Vegas," conventioneer Justin Krebs said. Krebs is a founder of Drinking Liberally, a group of progressives who meet in bars. "We wanted to mix politics and socializing." Drinking Liberally numbers 145 chapters nationwide, although, perhaps curiously, not in Las Vegas.

TURNS out YearlyKos didn't pick Vegas as a convention site because of its selection of nightclubs, strip clubs, bars or other diversions, as is the case with so many conventions. "We chose Las Vegas for the cost," Ingalsbee said. "We were more concerned with what we were able to produce than where we were producing it. There are a lot of people who do not like the city of Vegas, but they came here specifically for this convention."