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Methinks someone with some tech savvy is screwing with the Wizbang Weblog Awards. Some blogs that I’ve never even heard of are running away with a few of categories.
Update (0643 12-6): It does seem to be evening out now. And poor N.Z. Bear is at the bottom of the list in his category.
Meryl has some good observations on the awards phenomenon on her site, in addition to those below.
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James,
I was just going to say the same thing.
Unfortunately, and through no fault of Kevin’s, the awards aren’t that valid anyway. For example, I’m nominated in the Mauradin Marsupial category. However, so is Worldwiderant, a blog that has WAY more traffic than me. Guess who has the better chance of winning? If I ask my readers to vote for me, and Jay and Jane ask theirs to vote for them, it’s no contest.
And before anyone says I’m whining, I actually VOTED for worldwiderant. LOL! They’re one of my favorite people to read every day (except you of course!)
Look at LGF – all Charles had to do was ask the masses to vote for him and they did. Sullivan probably would never do that.
What I am saying is that I think maybe ten people should have judged them. All it will turn out to be is a popularity contest – or, ike you implied, cheating.
But Kevin’s tech savvy enough to catch ’em.
And I’d like to point out that just because you haven’t heard of a blog doesn’t mean that thousands of other people haven’t, either. There are literally millions of weblogs. I could name a dozen techblogs that you’ve never heard of, yet all have a following at least as big as yours.
Some tradeoffs have to be made. I can lock it down tight as a drum, but then AOL users can’t vote. Is that fair? Probably not.
Anyway the sites in the Best Overall Blog were carefully screened, and like Meryl said, just because they may not be on everyones daily read list doesn’t mean they’re not on a large portion of other peoples daily read list.
By running the contest for a week I’m hoping that the ebb and flows will even out in the long run.
It’s certainly true I don’t read the tech sites. Indeed, I don’t think sites like “boing boing” are really even blogs. But I do monitor the Ecosystem and other meta listings. It’s hard to think a site could be the best blog and yet not be on the top 50.
Michael’s point on validity is, of course, a good one. The same thing happened with John Hawkins’ poll: InstaPundit was both the “best blog” and the “most overrated blog.” It’s also true that traffic and linkage don’t correspond all that well. OTB and Wizbang rank well ahead of a lot of much higher traffic blogs in the linkage ratings.
And it does look to be “evening out”–with LGF now moving to the top. I don’t read it these days, but I’m well aware of it.
