With a droll, self-deprecating demeanor, Robert Wright engages a smiling Mickey Kaus each week in a conversation broadcast on their Web site, Bloggingheads.tv. Their running quarrel has attracted a growing number of Web users who want to see rather than merely read bloggers — and who appreciate the efforts to wrestle with the issues of the day.

Mr. Wright, a lean, neatly dressed fellow with a slightly dyspeptic online persona, is more liberal than Mr. Kaus. The founder of the blog Kausfiles is a more lying-in-the-reeds, crocodilian type who describes himself a conservative Democrat. Even this is open to debate, Mr. Wright says: "There's widespread suspicion that his claim to be a conservative Democrat is less than completely forthcoming..."

Popular bloggers, Mr. Wright said, tend to have followings of people who are curious about what they look like. Enter Bloggingheads.tv. The company logo features a stick-figure illustration with a head inside a television monitor walking on two feet.

There are no commercial breaks, allowing the bloggers an in-depth and open-ended coverage of the issues. The subject matter — a mix of politics and some culture — makes the Webcast appear as though employees of the New Republic or the American Prospect had taken over a local news station and set up shop to discuss their differences with the National Review and the American Spectator.

Their Web site grew out of long phone conversations between Messrs. Wright and Kaus. "I found them very productive," Mr. Kaus said. "I always thought the talks were actually more useful than anything I write." They started the site with hopes that nuanced, open-ended discussion could reach a level of analysis beyond that of daily newspapers.

From his home in California, Mr. Kaus appears on a split screen alongside Mr. Wright, who is in New Jersey. They are sometimes informally attired, and in the background one can see such things as bookcases, filing cabinets, and air-conditioners. Mr. Wright's remarks are sometimes punctuated by gulps from a plastic cup or a roll of his eyes at Mr. Kaus's latest point.

At times, the video feed makes it feel like one is watching slow-motion NASA footage. Mr. Wright recalled the time a barking dog was heard in the background. But visitors to the site may be witnessing the beginnings of a new information and entertainment form, a kind of a garage band, so to speak, which could eventually fill a stadium. The Web site already draws about 150,000 visitors a month...

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