Technorati 100 Here Today Gone Tomorrow

Based on the recent discussion about new gatekeepers, I recently wondered whether we were just deluding ourselves in thinking that there were gatekeepers. What provoked this line of thinking was a recent comment by Doc Searls in which he says that “being an alpha blogger was like being an alpha paramecium.” This pushed me to analyze the rank of move within the Technorati 100. As frequent readers of this blog know, I did a study back in May 2005, in which I analyzed linkage to members of the Technorati 100. Using this data as a point in time, I have now decided to revisit the list and see how much movement happened.

The first thing to do was to map out which of the May 19, 2005 members were still on the list. The results looked like this:

Blog TitlePosition 5/19/05Position 2/20/06
Boing Boing11
InstaPundit212
Daily Kos35
Gizmodo49
Fark523
EnGadget62
Davenetics7Â 
Eschaton836
Dooce915
Andrew Sullivan1051
The Best Page In The Universe1152
Talking Points Memo: by Joshua MicahMarshall 1226
lgf: anti-idiotarian1335
kottke.org1421
WIL WHEATON DOT NET15Â 
Metafilter1647
Doc Searls1792
(In)formacao e (In)utilidade18Â 
Wonkette1925
Scripting News2095
Power Line2133
Balmasque22Â 
Corante23Â 
A list Apart2417
Something Awful2544
Megatokyo26Â 
Michelle Malkin2710
Arts and Letters Daily28Â 
Gawker2919
Afterall it was the best I ever had30Â 
The Volokh Conspiracy3174
Scobelizer3234
Jeffrey Zeldman33Â 
This Modern World34Â 
The Web Standards Project3557
Joel on Software3639
Media Matters for America37Â 
Television without pity38Â 
Kuro5hin39Â 
Lileks40Â 
Hugh Hewitt4155
Joel Veitch42Â 
Truthout43Â 
Baghdad Burning44Â 
Buzz machine4560
fleugel46Â 
Informed Comment4793
Doppler: redefining podcasting48Â 
geek and proud49Â 
loadmemory (Asian site)50Â 
Photojunkie51Â 
Ross Rader52Â 
The Truth Laid Bear53Â 
Joi Ito54Â 
ScrappleFace55Â 
LexText56Â 
Google Blog578
Xbox58Â 
My life in a Bush of Ghosts59Â 
Astronomy picture of the day60Â 
Crooked Timber61Â 
Vodka Pundit62Â 
Captain’s quarter6370
A small victory64Â 
Gato Fedorento65Â 
Mezzoblue66Â 
PostSecret674
Samizdata.net68Â 
Lawrence Lessig69Â 
Counterpunch70Â 
Democractic Underground71Â 
Right Wing News72Â 
StopDesign73Â 
iBiblio74Â 
Samizdata.net (mistake?)75Â 
Abrupto76Â 
gene7299 (Asian MSNSpaces site)77Â 
Where is Raed78Â 
B3TA: We love the web79Â 
Talkleft80Â 
Wizbang81Â 
m1net (MSN spaces site)82Â 
Hoder83Â 
CTRL+Alt+Del84Â 
Brad DeLong85Â 
Blogs for Bush86Â 
Neil Gaiman87Â 
Gothamist8885
Thought Mechanics897
IMAO90Â 
Dan Gillmor (old weblog)91Â 
HINAGATA92Â 
Dean’s World93Â 
Defamer9453
USS Clueless95Â 
Dive into Mark96Â 
Pandagon97Â 
Blogging.la98Â 
Why are you worshipping the ground I blog on?99Â 
Daring Fireball100Â 

This provided me with a departure point but it wasn’t really getting at what I wanted. Obviously, a fair number of people had changed position. So I decided to take a cut of the same data on the 20th of February and start mapping out movement. It looked as follows:

Position 2/20/06NamePosition on 5/19/05
1Boing Boing1
2Engadget6
3File LodgeÂ 
4PostSecret67
5Daily Kos3
6The Huffington PostÂ 
7Thought Mechanics89
8Official Google Blog57
9Gizmodo4
10Michelle Malkin27
11Blog di Beppe GrilloÂ 
12Instapundit2
13Crooks and LiarsÂ 
14LifehackerÂ 
15dooce9
16Herramientas para BlogsÂ 
17A List Apart24
18Think ProgressÂ 
19Gawker29
20MSN-SA (MSN Spaces)Â 
21kottke.org14
22shiraishi.seesaa.netÂ 
23Fark5
24AV Watch Title PageÂ 
25Wonkette19
26Talking Points Memo: by Joshua Micah Marshall12
27The Space CraftÂ 
28JoystiqÂ 
29The SuperficialÂ 
30TechCrunchÂ 
31Weebls Stuff NewsÂ 
32manabekawori (Japanese)Â 
33Power Line21
34Scobleizer32
35lgf13
36Eschaton8
37Autoblog ChinaÂ 
38Google BlogoscopedÂ 
39Joel on Software36
40XiaxueÂ 
41AMERICAblogÂ 
42atnewz.jpÂ 
43WRETCH BlogÂ 
44Something Awful25
45nosz50jÂ 
46Overheard in New YorkÂ 
47Metafilter16
48Cute OverloadÂ 
49Paul GrahamÂ 
50The Unofficial Apple WeblogÂ 
51Andrew Sullivan10
52The Best Page In The Universe.11
53Defamer94
54Mark’s Sysinternals BlogÂ 
55Hugh Hewitt41
56Techdirt.Â 
57The Web Standards Project35
58Stuff On My CatÂ 
59Om Malik
60BuzzMachine45
61Break.comÂ 
62Dr DaveÂ 
63Pink Is The New BlogÂ 
64MicrosiervosÂ 
65Signal vs. Noise (by 37signals)Â 
66Micro PersuasionÂ 
67Blogcritics.orgÂ 
68Poynter OnlineÂ 
69excite.co.jp/News/oddÂ 
70Captain’s Quarters63
71MAKE: BlogÂ 
72AamukasteÂ 
73John BattelleÂ 
74The Volokh Conspiracy31
75TPMCafeÂ 
76dumpalink.comÂ 
77iammewÂ 
78Seth GodinÂ 
79hcy521Â 
80Search Engine WatchÂ 
81The Corner on National Review OnlineÂ 
82toothpaste for dinnerÂ 
83aki09041Â 
84slimÂ 
85Gothamist88
86strawberry2Â 
87AutoblogÂ 
88VG CatsÂ 
89Yarn HarlotÂ 
90BILDblogÂ 
91Ain’t It Cool News
92The Doc Searls Weblog17
93Informed Comment47
94Rather GoodÂ 
95Scripting News20
96SemiologicÂ 
97we make money not artÂ 
98waiterrant.netÂ 
99atsuya furutaÂ 
100TreehuggerÂ 

This provided me with two points in time: One in May 2005 and one in February 2006, 9 months later. If the theory of gatekeepers held true, the lists should have been pretty consistent.

What the data showed, however, was that the technorati 100 list is a very dynamic one. Let’s take a look at some of the moves.

Boing Boing: King of the blogosphere

Only one blog, Boing Boing, manage to hold its position steady in the last 9 months. Sitting at the top spot, it looks like it won’t move for a long time to come.

The movers and shakers

In this new list, 9 blogs successfully moved up in the last 9 months. They are:

  • EnGadget (from 6 to 2)
  • Post Secret (67 to 4)
  • Thought Mechanics (89 to 7)
  • Google official blog (57 to 8)
  • Michelle Malkin (27 to 10)
  • A list apart (24 to 17)
  • Gawker (29 to 19)
  • Defamer (94 to 53)
  • Gothamist (88 to 85)

Those were all blogs that appeared on both lists and managed to climb up in the ranks. More surprising, however, was the fact that 65 new bloggers appeared on the list, new claimant to the title of top blogger. A quick analysis seems to point to Asian blogs becoming a major force, one that I personally have not heard much about in discussion of the evolution of the blogosphere. David Sifry’s State of the Blogosphere did not cover any of this type of movement when he did his last overview of the state of the blogosphere. I don’t know if he deliberately decided to ignore the data or whether he did not see it as that important but I consider this a pretty powerful observation. In a world where globalisation is key, the blogosphere has not yet fully grappled with the impact of the Asian Pacific region and there probably will be some interesting discussion around this in the future.

From a legacy standpoint, it also seems that upward moves are not fully distributed across the space. The following table shows how the legacy upward moves were distributed among the population:

Top 105
Top 257
Top 507
Bottom 10Â 
Bottom 251
Bottom 502

So being in the top 50 percentile makes it easier to move up, which would give some credence to a network effect. However, because we are talking about such a small segment of the population, it is impossible to generate any meaningful conclusion from the data.

The endangered list

While 65 blogs already dropped off the list, the 25 following blogs are in danger for the next 9 months as they have suffered a drop in ranking over the last 9 months:

  • Daily Kos (from 3 to 5)
  • Gizmodo (4 to 9)
  • Instapundit (2 to 12)
  • Dooce (9 to 15)
  • Kottke (14 to 21)
  • Fark (5 to 23)
  • Wonkette (19 to 25)
  • Talking Points Memo (12 to 26)
  • Powerline (21 to 33)
  • Scobelizer (32 to 34)
  • LGF (13 to 35)
  • Eschaton (8 to 36)
  • Joel On Software (36 to 39)
  • Something Awful (25 to 44)
  • Metafilter (16 to 47)
  • Andrew Sullivan (10 to 51)
  • Best Page in the Universe (11 to 52)
  • Hugh Hewitt (41 to 55)
  • Web Standard Project (35 to 57)
  • Buzz Machine (45 to 60)
  • Captain’s Quarter (63 to 70)
  • The Volokh conspiracy (31 to 74)
  • Doc Searls (17 to 92)
  • Informed Comment (47 to 93)
  • Scripting News (20 to 95)

The interesting thing, in terms of that drop is that it seems to affect members across the list as a whole in a similar fashion. A quick analysis of the drop breakdown shows no clear advantage in being near the top of the list versus being closer to the bottom:

Top 102
To 257
Top 5015
Bottom 103
Bottom 253
Bottom 5010

More interesting is that this number is low compared to the blogs which disappeared completely from the top 100. That number stands at 65 and breaks down as follows:

From top 101
From top 255
From top 5020
From bottom 5045
From bottom 2522
From bottom: 109

A dynamic list

If you take those numbers, it means that a total of 90 blogs (25 dropping within the list and another 65 dropping off the list completely) ended up with a lower position in 9 months. Combined with the fact that 9 blogs moved up, this means that 99 percent of the list was dynamic.

This, to me, was a pretty stunning revelation: while there is much obsession about who is and isn’t on those lists, it seems that their nature is a lot more dynamic than expected. Going beyond that, it also look like being on top is no guarantee that you will stay there (if anything, it is a guarantee that you will not, as 9 out of 10 blogs fell and 65 percent disappeared from the list altogether).

Because the overwhelming majority of the blogs listed in May 2005 experienced a downward spin, it seems that the concept of a network effect is widely overstated. In fact, there seems to be the equivalent of a reverse pull, where being a Technorati 100 is only a short lived glory.

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