No. 18 Matthew Haughey

September 21, 2007 7:15 AM

NxE’s Fifty Most Influential Bloggers (whoever NxE is). Anyway, Matt made no. 18.

However, with Malkin at 16 and Denton at 1, please use this for entertainment purposes only.

posted by caddis to MetaFilter-related at 7:15 AM (79 comments total)

Link?
posted by Steven C. Den Beste at 7:24 AM on September 21, 2007

Link?

You just have to take caddis' word for it.
posted by flapjax at midnite at 7:25 AM on September 21, 2007

Link?

No way. It's a private 50 person internet.
posted by R. Mutt at 7:26 AM on September 21, 2007

Link here. I love the picture they chose for Malkin. Good thing the editors at that site seem to like you, Matt. Your meatbeard picture could have made it.
posted by Terminal Verbosity at 7:26 AM on September 21, 2007

"NorthxEast is a blog about blogging."
More interesting is just why lists of whatever are soooo popular on the internet.
posted by peacay at 7:29 AM on September 21, 2007

sorry, I screwed up the link, thanks tv.
posted by caddis at 7:29 AM on September 21, 2007

This just in, a blog mentions MetaFilter.
posted by flapjax at midnite at 7:40 AM on September 21, 2007

"NorthxEast is a blog about blogging."

But you can safely ignore it. It's not like it's one of the 50 most influential bloggers or anything.

At least according to a recently published list by NorthxEast blog
posted by Pastabagel at 7:42 AM on September 21, 2007

This just in, a blog mentions MetaFilter.

Hey, I just mentioned Ask on my site. Should I start a MeTa thread?
posted by COBRA! at 7:42 AM on September 21, 2007

Wow Matt looks like that guy from Heroes.
posted by iconomy at 7:43 AM on September 21, 2007

However, with Malkin at 16 and Denton at 1, please use this for entertainment purposes only.

It's a list of influential people. Doesn't matter if they're crazed republicians or whatever Dention is, if got influence, they got influence.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 7:49 AM on September 21, 2007

More impressive is the fact that a website posted a list of 50 items all on a single page.

I was pleasantly surprised that once I scolled past #41 I didn't see a "Next 10" link waiting for me.
posted by davey_darling at 7:51 AM on September 21, 2007 [4 favorites]

I love the picture they chose for Malkin.

She will be mine.
posted by LarryC at 7:55 AM on September 21, 2007

pastabagel writes: "NorthxEast is a blog about blogging."

But you can safely ignore it. It's not like it's one of the 50 most influential bloggers or anything.

At least according to a recently published list by NorthxEast blog

Not so! The actually didguy make it onto his own list... He's #47.
posted by flapjax at midnite at 7:57 AM on September 21, 2007

Wow, that was one fucked up comment. Anyway, you know what I mean.
posted by flapjax at midnite at 7:58 AM on September 21, 2007

I mentioned Metafilter in a conversaion today.

I'd post a link, but they don't have <a> tags in real life yet.
posted by armoured-ant at 8:19 AM on September 21, 2007

Wait - I had TypoLock on.
posted by armoured-ant at 8:19 AM on September 21, 2007 [1 favorite]

However, with Malkin at 16 and Denton at 1, please use this for entertainment purposes only

Not sure why you'd say that. Malkin is clearly one of the most influential bloggers on the internet. The only poltical pundits who have a better effect spreading their rhetoric, like Coulter, Dobson, and Limbaugh, don't blog.

Kos and Glenn Reynolds are both on the list, but in a sense they are far less effective in message-spreading than Malkin. Reynolds is popular but has almost never created a talking point on his own; in fact his very schtick is to link to horrific right-wing viewpoints in a winking way as not to say he actually agrees with it. Kos has spent three months trying to get Democrats to defeat Republicans on the senate floor and failed. Malkin, however, demanded a week ago that MoveOn.org be declared a terrorist group and got a resolution passed yesterday.

If you can find be a single person online who is more effective than her at creating hate and forming an actual political view based on it, I'm anxious to hear it.
posted by XQUZYPHYR at 8:24 AM on September 21, 2007 [1 favorite]

Denton, meanwhile, controls what- ten of the fifteen most popular blogs on the internet? I didn't really think that needs much discussion there. The irony is Wonkette is probably the most known but least saturated of his holdings, as so many other political blogs shadow Wonkette's overall influence. But with the entertainment, gossip, and tech blogs, Denton has a massive influence on pretty much all the other popular topics in blogging outside of politics.
posted by XQUZYPHYR at 8:26 AM on September 21, 2007

Wow Matt looks like that guy from Heroes.
posted by iconomy at 8:43 AM on September 21 [+] [!] [quote]

You think he looks like Hiro too?!?!?!?!
posted by blue_beetle at 8:30 AM on September 21, 2007

Well that's an interesting list of most influential American bloggers.
posted by goodnewsfortheinsane at 8:47 AM on September 21, 2007

I was pleasantly surprised that once I scolled past #41 I didn't see a "Next 10" link waiting for me.

Indeed! I was really really happy about that. Good job, NxE!

I like how they characterize metafilter as being for "stories and links" -- I'm hoping to see a sudden uptick in link-free stories about portobello mushrooms.
posted by Greg Nog at 8:54 AM on September 21, 2007

That picture of Joel Spolsky makes him look like a XDR TB patient. :\
posted by boo_radley at 9:01 AM on September 21, 2007

I was pleasantly surprised that once I scolled past #41 I didn't see a "Next 10" link waiting for me.

God, I was waiting for that too.
posted by Terminal Verbosity at 9:03 AM on September 21, 2007

Malkin looks a bit like she's going to spit venom into the eyes of those who oppose her.
posted by dismas at 9:21 AM on September 21, 2007

Where the hell is Perez Hilton on that list?
posted by The Confessor at 9:46 AM on September 21, 2007

dismas - she can use the Apeonaut's rather excellent Theme from Ming -- "Those who dare oppose us will stand knee-deep in the blood of their children"
posted by Abiezer at 10:04 AM on September 21, 2007 [1 favorite]

So is it influential blogs, or influential people who have blogs?
posted by smackfu at 10:10 AM on September 21, 2007

Influenza blogs. Viral memes. Hand me a tissue.
posted by It's Raining Florence Henderson at 10:16 AM on September 21, 2007 [1 favorite]

More interesting is just why lists of whatever are soooo popular on the internet.

Ads. Because they can do that horrible "Top 200 Pancakes" with five pancakes on each page, and forty pages of plentiful advertising. All without really having to use any brain power other than writing a pithy caption and adding a link.
posted by oneirodynia at 10:29 AM on September 21, 2007 [1 favorite]

I hadn't heard of many of these. I suck at the Internet.
posted by BitterOldPunk at 10:30 AM on September 21, 2007

bop, sucking at the internet is often caused by excelling at real life. Just a tip to help you focus your efforts in reducing the suckage.
posted by stupidsexyFlanders at 11:20 AM on September 21, 2007

If only the people they influenced weren't other bloggers.

Malkin excepted. And number 1, since I didn't know what a recumbent bike was called until I joined.
posted by Alvy Ampersand at 11:35 AM on September 21, 2007

The fact that these aren't only 5 or 10 on a page indicates poor web design. Everyone knows you separate long lists with ads and extra pages. The best lists have one number per page, with maybe an ad page every 5 or so.

People love lists like that.
posted by graventy at 12:09 PM on September 21, 2007 [2 favorites]

A quick glance at the list tells me that a number of these folks either are, or have been, active metafilter posters or commenters.

If I were more diligent, I'd try to figure out exactly how many. But I'm too damn lazy.
posted by dersins at 12:14 PM on September 21, 2007

"Kottke has been wildly popular for years, and has a very devoted readership. For many, his blog is the entire blogosphere."

To this, I would just like to say "lol".
posted by mr_crash_davis at 12:52 PM on September 21, 2007 [1 favorite]

Hm. If I were trying to astroturf promote my site, what would I do? Oh, I know, make a list of the 50 most widely-read bloggers and see if I could get a promo or linkback from maybe half of them.
posted by ikkyu2 at 12:54 PM on September 21, 2007 [2 favorites]

Aw, don't be such a cynic, ik. Have a Pepsi Blue, on the house*.

^*details apply
posted by cortex at 12:55 PM on September 21, 2007

He got a lower ranking then Rob Malda.
posted by delmoi at 12:57 PM on September 21, 2007

Well that's an interesting list of most influential American bloggers.

Well, duh, the Internet is American, isn't it?
posted by slogger at 1:00 PM on September 21, 2007

They list Ana Marie Cox, but don't seem to realize that she blogs for time magazine now.
posted by delmoi at 1:05 PM on September 21, 2007

8 of 50 are Gawker-related?
posted by peep at 1:10 PM on September 21, 2007

...and another half-dozen are SEO/SEM blogs (or in the case of the Google webrank blogger, fodder for them). This makes me sad.
posted by ardgedee at 1:34 PM on September 21, 2007

How "influential" are blogs? I can't think of anything important that I've done because of reading about it on a blog. (Plenty of trivial things, though...) Maybe I'm not influential enough for it to matter.
posted by The corpse in the library at 1:37 PM on September 21, 2007

Gawker and mefi go way back.
posted by empath at 1:39 PM on September 21, 2007

Gawker and mefi go way back.
posted by empath at 2:39 PM on September 21 [+] [!]

First comment from that post:

That weblog is a yuppie disaster.

"Weblog." "Yuppie." Gosh we were young once.
posted by Terminal Verbosity at 1:47 PM on September 21, 2007

I don't understand the term "search engine optimization" anyway. Surely the people who work for Google are the ones optimizing the search engines, not some blogger.
posted by kindall at 1:55 PM on September 21, 2007

They list Ana Marie Cox, but don't seem to realize that she blogs for time magazine now.

From the article:

She also wrote for Time magazine, contributing a D.C. column and writing for Time’s blog

So, except for that part, yeah, they never mention it.

I agree that they fucked up with exclusion of Perez Hilton, who matches TMZ's influence beyond the normal geeks of the blogosphere.
posted by eyeballkid at 2:14 PM on September 21, 2007

Gawker and mefi go way back.

Oh, this cracked me up. Hi, Choire! How's work?
posted by padraigin at 2:18 PM on September 21, 2007

I don't understand the term "search engine optimization" anyway. Surely the people who work for Google are the ones optimizing the search engines, not some blogger.

Search engine optimization is about making it easier for users to find your site via search engines. (wikipedia)
posted by philomathoholic at 2:23 PM on September 21, 2007

This drink, it fizzles?
posted by ikkyu2 at 2:35 PM on September 21, 2007

I guess because I joined later in the game I didn't know this, but it's kind of intresting.
posted by jourman2 at 3:02 PM on September 21, 2007

They say that Josh Marshall started blogging in 2000, which is wrong.
posted by Mid at 3:03 PM on September 21, 2007

iconomy: Wow Matt looks like that guy from Heroes.

Before this week I had not seen so much as a second of Heroes. However, the other day I visited a friend of mine and he happened to be watching a fairly graphic scene where Sylar eats someone's brain and all the time I kept thinking: "Oh my God! That's Matt eating someone's brain!"

The following night I slept like a baby.
posted by Kattullus at 3:14 PM on September 21, 2007

We're still only second-ranked on google for 'filthy rabbit limericks'. I think we could have tried harder.
posted by Wolfdog at 3:55 PM on September 21, 2007

WE'RE NUMBER EIGHTEEN!!!!! WE'RE NUMBER EIGHTEEN!!!!

*Puts on giant sponge 18 finger glove thing*
posted by The Deej at 4:03 PM on September 21, 2007

Filthy Rabbit Limericks?
posted by smackfu at 4:34 PM on September 21, 2007

"Weblog." "Yuppie." Gosh we were young once.

I don't know, MeFi seems to be pretty damn yuppie to me. There are us old farts, and some kids, but the sweet spot is young, urban and professional (professional at what is your option), knid of like Matt. Like attracts like.
posted by caddis at 5:10 PM on September 21, 2007

I am so blogfluential, I merely raised one rhetorical blogbrow, bloggily, and they got The Fear, and removed me from the list, because the slightest blogword from my mighty bloghammer of blogjustice would wipe their paltry blogbutts from the blogternets, but I just don't want more of the blogfame, riches, and cocaine-from-teenage-girls'-bellies that come with Blog Influence. Enough, already, said I on my influential weblog, in a blogpost in which I blogged about the bloglist, and they listened, and they omitted.
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 6:06 PM on September 21, 2007 [2 favorites]

On my blog, I blog about blogs that blog about blogging.
posted by sanko at 6:22 PM on September 21, 2007 [1 favorite]

I blogged your mother.
posted by cortex at 6:41 PM on September 21, 2007

NxE’s Fifty Most Influential Bloggers

To be followed by The Fifty Richest Homeless People, The Fifty Most Powerful Gitmo Detainees and The Fifty Biggest Selling Mormon Rappers. I didn't recognize a single name until Josh Marshall, and it was another long stretch before I recognized a second one.
posted by George_Spiggott at 6:50 PM on September 21, 2007 [1 favorite]

I've never heard of all but two or three of them either. This John Chow guy baffles me:

In recent years, what began as a personal blog has grown into a money-spinning Mecca of JohnChowites, flocking to discuss all manner of blog-related money making schemes

Does this guy really make 18 grand a month for bad writing about how much money his blog makes? This makes no sense at all to me.
posted by jamesonandwater at 7:23 PM on September 21, 2007 [1 favorite]

blogosphere blogoSPHERE BLOGOSPHERE

What the fuckety fuck will it take to KILL THIS WORD?
posted by disclaimer at 7:29 PM on September 21, 2007 [1 favorite]

I know what you mean. A guy on Metafilter just used it three times in a fourteen word comment.
posted by George_Spiggott at 7:33 PM on September 21, 2007 [1 favorite]

Buffalo buffalo blog buffalo buffalo blog blog.
posted by Devils Rancher at 7:53 PM on September 21, 2007

LOGOS is the word. The word is the world.

That 'b' at the beginning just clarifies that we're talking b-list, here.
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 8:46 PM on September 21, 2007

What the fuckety fuck will it take to KILL THIS WORD?

A hammer the size of the blogiverse.
posted by cortex at 9:05 PM on September 21, 2007

Is that a bloghammer?

fyi-- most perplexing google image search ever. what the fuck is with all the bunnies?
posted by dersins at 10:36 PM on September 21, 2007

It appears that the blog most of those pics come from has another blog listed in its sidebar with the linktext "bloghammer". Which is kind of a weak connection for the image search, but Google will take what it can get I guess.
posted by cortex at 10:38 PM on September 21, 2007

Well fuck google, then. Fuck it right in the ass.
posted by dersins at 10:47 PM on September 21, 2007

More interesting is just why lists of whatever are soooo popular on the internet.

Writers and editors love them because they require little brainpower or effort to create -- the writer asks a few people (maybe just other people working in the office that day) to list their favorite X. The writer combines lists, adds one or two explanatory lines, and maybe googles around a little to fill in some blanks. And voila, the top 10 movie deaths (that's the current CNN stupid list).

People love to read them because they require little time and no brainpower. They're conversation fodder -- "Oh, yeah, I loved that one." and "But this list doesn't even have the most important one..." -- and so they spread as people attach their own opinions to them.

And you don't really need to ask why a list about bloggers is particularly interesting to bloggers, do you?
posted by pracowity at 11:33 PM on September 21, 2007

I was being somewhat rhetorical about list popularity. You're right of course - lowest common denominator in production and consumption. I tend to be wary of anything these days that starts: Top Ten Ways To.., Five Reasons.., Twenty Best.., Six Fullproof Methods...etc etc
posted by peacay at 11:57 PM on September 21, 2007

This sort of thing is definitely getting a slot on my Top Eleven Mercenary Ploys For Readership roundup.
posted by cortex at 7:12 AM on September 22, 2007

Au contraire, pracowity, I think it's homage to the earliest traditions of human literature - the great list of heroes present for battle in the Tain Bo Culaigne, the genealogical lists in the Old Testament, the 108 Outlaws of the Water Margin. These bold blog entries are glittering threads in the great tapestry of human narrative woven back to pre-literate times. And how much the internet and its commenting has done to return us to those times!
posted by Abiezer at 7:43 AM on September 22, 2007 [1 favorite]

the 108 Outlaws of the Water Margin

Awesome.
posted by Alvy Ampersand at 8:11 AM on September 22, 2007

Hey, if you like that NorthXEast site you can buy it. Looks like the author got bored trying to become the next Scoble or Techcrunch wanker.

The guy bloggs a bunch of banal, obvious crap for a couple of months (Posts maybe 20/30 posts. I'm to lazy to count) and then tries to cash out.
posted by delmoi at 3:04 PM on September 22, 2007

Yeah, what does he think this is, 1999?
posted by hattifattener at 11:40 AM on September 23, 2007

Filthy Rabbit Limericks?
Well done.
posted by Wolfdog at 12:34 PM on September 27, 2007