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It's interesting to me that you didn't use Technorati rankings for this.
scrub
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When I started blogging, (Sept. 2003), everyone used the Ecosystem to monitor where they stacked up against other sites. It also has more depth than Technorati.
For those who thought blogs were basically online journals, it's not uncommon for major political stories to begin their life on a blog. For example,
Powerline and
Little Green Footballs broke the Dan Rather / Bush / fake National Guard memos 60 minutes story that led to Rather's retirement. The Reuters photographer who was fired for photoshopping pictures from Lebanon was busted by blogs. I'm too lazy to go research which site broke the story, but an example is
here.
Other useful sites:
Memeorandum highlights which news stories are being followed by blogs and links to blog posts about those stories.
Blogs Now tracks link popularity which can be interesting to find random stuff you might have missed, for example,
pictures of the shuttle launch from space; or did you know that Scott Adams, or Dilbert fame, had
lost his voice 18 months ago? His doctor says no one has ever been cured, but as of yesterday, he had his voice back.
You young pups need to get with this internet age. [img]/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img]
The Poker Mom