The Huffington Post (often referred to on the Internet as HuffPo) is a liberal news website and aggregated weblog founded by Arianna Huffington and Kenneth Lerer, featuring various news sources and columnists. The site covers a wide range of topics, including sections devoted to politics, entertainment, media, living, business, and the green movement. The Huffington Post was launched on May 9, 2005 as a commentary outlet. Its roster of bloggers includes many people from Arianna Huffington's network of prominent friends.

Contributors

In addition to columns by Huffington and a core group of contributors (such as Harry Shearer, John Conyers, and Rosie O'Donnell) and Roy Sekoff, Founding Editor, the Huffington Post has featured notable celebrity contributors from politics, journalism, business, and entertainment (Norman Mailer, John Cusack, and Bill Maher). The Huffington Post publishes scoops of current news stories, otherwise providing links to selected prominent news stories, providing a liberal counterpoint to sites such as The Drudge Report. Compared to other left-wing blogs such as the expertise-heavy Znet or the long-established Daily Kos, The Huffington Post offers both news commentary and coverage. It has a policy of encouraging comments from all parts of the political spectrum. The comment section is home to discussions on politics, religion, and world affairs.

The Huffington Post's OffTheBus is a citizen-powered online news organization that is a collaboration between The Huffington Post, NYU, and Jay Rosen's NewsAssignment.Net. The Huffington Post's FundRace is a website that tracks contributions to the presidential campaigns and includes a mapping feature that shows contributions broken down by city, neighborhood, and block.

A comprehensive list of contributors to the The Huffington Post blog can be found in its alphabetical Bloggers Index.

Investment

The site now has invested in Vlogging, or video blogging, with many of the site contributors contributing via video, and capturing clips in the media and posting them on the site.

Awards

The Huffington Post won the 2006 and 2007 Webby Awards for Best Politics Blog.

Huffington Post contributor Bennet Kelley was awarded the Los Angeles Press Club's 2007 Southern California Journalism Award for Online Commentary for political commentary published on the site.

It is ranked the most powerful blog in the world by The Observer.

Controversy

Fox News television anchor Bill O'Reilly, as well as conservative media watchdog MRC, have brought attention to the Huffington Post hosting controversial statements on its blogs, and Arianna Huffington's initial refusal to remove them. Some examples include various independent authors sharply criticizing Americans supportive of the War in Iraq, accusing Dick Cheney of terrorizing enemies abroad and innocent citizens at home, and criticizing the Bush administration for indiscriminate spending.