Via Atrios, Hotsoup co-founder and former hotshot Associated Press reporter Ron Fournier has fled back to the welcoming embrace of the AP. Why? Because the concept for the site — “the first online community that joins Opinion Drivers from across the spectrum” — makes no sense. As a result, no one is reading it. The gory Alexa traffic data shows a peak when the site launched followed by a slide into oblivion:

Like the floundering third-party group Unity ’08, Hotsoup was supposed to capitalize on Americans’ hunger for bipartisanship. But the idea behind both organizations is wrong. Would most Americans like more choices in politics or less polarization? Sure. But Hotsoup and Unity ’08 fail to understand two fundamental principles of politics:

(1) Investing time and energy in building a new party — or contributing to an online political community — is essentially irrational from a cost-benefit perspective. The only reason to spend the time to do it is if you really, really care. And the people who really, really care tend to be ideologically extreme, not centrists.
(2) Getting people involved in a new party or political community is a coordination game. Person A has little incentive to make the effort to take part if persons B-Z are going to decide not to join up, causing the organization to fail. And when the prospects for the party or website are slim, people rationally decide not to invest their time.