Saturday, April 07, 2007

You Need To Get a Life

First Law of Weblogging: When entering this arena, never take yourself too seriously.
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I received an email the other day announcing the fact that, according to BlogNetNews, From On High is the seventh most influential weblog in the state of Virginia. I couldn't tell you why, nor how that opinion was derived. I made note of the fact that I was ranked just behind the kids-with-keyboards over at Raising Kaine and just ahead of Ben Tribbett at Not Larry Sabato.

I gave the news cursory thought, and I then deleted the email and went about my life.

But I got to thinking this morning that, as much as I don't care about such things, I know someone who does. I resolved to see what Ben has to say about this affront to his very being. From on High is more influential than that which he devotes his every waking moment, his very existence to? That can't be sitting well.

As I suspected, his undies are in a major bunch:
BlogNetNews has a new ranking for most influential Virginia blogs. Here's the top 10:
1) Virginia Virtucon
2) Black Velvet Bruce Li
3) Mason Conservative
4) Ward View
5) Bearing Drift
6) Raising Kaine
7) From On High
8) Not Larry Sabato
9) VB Dems
10) Below the Beltway

Lowell has some thoughts up- including the fact the guy doing this ranking used to be a Bush speech-writer. Unbelievable. Like Lowell, I'm mad- this is bordering on an outright lie-and I feel personally smeared.
By the way only four of the "Top 10" use Sitemeter, but here are the traffic levels in the last week:
Not Larry Sabato 15,979 (40,958 page views)
Raising Kaine 12,877 (36,057 page views)
Black Velvet Bruce Li 4,390 (10,063 page views)
Bearing Drift 2,517 (7,979 page views)

I don't appreciate this guy lying and misleading people. That's f***ed up.
Whew. This over a silly weblog ranking. I wonder how he'd react if I had stolen his bicycle.

Ben, three things:

1) You accuse "this guy" of misleading people and, at the same time, you mislead people by suggesting that I don't use Sitemeter. I do. I see your error as a simple oversight, however, not some plot against our democratic way of life, and certainly not an attack on my manhood.

2) The ranking is accurate. Deal with it.

3) Get your arms around the concept of influence: A power to affect persons or events, especially power based on prestige, etc.

You write gobs of stuff each day. And you have a sizeable teenage following. It can probably be said with confidence that you even influence them to want to vote some day when they are old enough. But when it comes to the power to affect adults and to affect events of consequence, well ...

... some got it and some don't, big guy.

Here's hoping you can move out of the "also ran" category when the next ranking comes out.

In the meantime, I'm seventh and you're not. Bummer.

Oh, and (4) Don't forget The First Law of Weblogging.