Blogs Promote Patriot to #1 at Amazon: While many corporate executives remain resolutely oblivious to the blogosphere, there is more and more anecdotal evidence of its power to shape opinions and move products.

The latest, from the field of publishing, is the success of Glenn Greenwald’s How Would a Patriot Act? Greenwald is a prominent political blogger—a First Amendment attorney, civil libertarian, and staunch critic of President Bush—and his publisher has never published anything before, but his book became the highest-ranking title on Amazon.com for three straight days “without a single penny being spent on marketing or advertising.”

Instead, he used his own blog and those of a handful of online friends to promote the title to their readers. Publishers Weekly’s Sara Nelson details the phenomenon in her latest column: “The Internet has been used wisely as a promotional tool before (I'm thinking of author MJ Rose, among many other early adopters) and, as many an anxious refresh-button–pushing author will tell you, a couple of good days on one Web retailer does not necessarily a bestseller make. Still, now that virtually every major retail outlet, online and off, has placed its orders, I can't help thinking we're going to be hearing and seeing more of Greenwald and his Patriot Act."