Gates of Vienna: So Who Are the Top 100 Blogs? Not Who I’d Have Thought

This Carnegie Mellon Computer Science study won the prize for “Best Student Paper.”

The title of the paper is “Cost-Effective Outbreak Detection in Networks.“

Here is their question:

Blog rankings

Rankings are based on the following question: Which blogs should one read to be most up to date, i.e., to quickly know about important stories that propagate over the blogosphere? [emphasis added]

Budget=100 blogs: If we can read 100 blogs, which should I read to be most up to date? Unit cost (each blog costs 1 unit), optimizing the information captured (we want to be the first to know about something with many people blogging about the story after us)

Budget=5000 posts: If we can read the total of 5000 posts, which blogs should one read? Cost of reading a blog is the number of posts it has, we optimize the information captured

Multicriterion solution: We want to read both a small number of blogs and a small number of posts. These results are from the experiment on figure 4(a) from the paper. We find the right budget where value of objective function is 40%. Cost of a blog is a combination of a number of posts (NP) a blog has plus a constant (UC).

Here is their real-life comparison:

The spread of information in the blogosphere: First blog writes a post and then other blogs refer to it. The behavior (information) spreads (cascades) through the network of blogs.

Water distribution networks

[The] same techniques and algorithms as used for blogs also apply to detecting disease outbreaks in water distribution networks. Consider a city water distribution network, delivering water to households via pipes and junctions. Intrusions can cause contaminants to spread over the network, and we want to select a few locations (pipe junctions) to install sensors, in order to detect these contaminations as quickly as possible.

The sensor placements obtained by our algorithm are provably near optimal, providing a constant fraction of the optimal solution. Our approach scales, achieving speedups and savings in storage of several orders of magnitude.

This same link also provides their algorithm and some illustrations, plus links to more detailed information. Don't know that I care for being compard to contaminated water, however. Couldn't they have done something with, say, ice cream?

This is the .pdf of their paper, with illustrations of how the cascades work.

But what is surprising is the list they came up with. Of course, #1 is no surprise at all -Instapundit, of course. But after that, it’s up for grabs:

Here’s some data regarding the parameters of their table:

Top 100 blogs for unit cost case and PA objective function

PA score : score for the solution of length k
NP : number of posts of a blog in 2006
IL : number of inlinks that a blog got from other blogs inside the dataset in 2006
OLO : number of outlinks to other blogs in the dataset
OLA : number of all outlinks (also counting links other resources on the web)

The table is below the fold. You’re going to be surprised at some of the blogs that made the list, and some that are noticeably absent.
- - - - - - - - -

k	PA score	Blog	NP	IL	OLO	OLA
1	0.1283	instapundit.com	4593	4636	1890	5255
2	0.1822	donsurber.blogspot.com	1534	1206	679	3495
3	0.2224	sciencepolitics.blogspot.com	924	576	888	2701
4	0.2592	watcherofweasels.com	261	941	1733	3630
5	0.2923	michellemalkin.com	1839	12642	1179	6323
6	0.3152	blogometer.nationaljournal.com	189	2313	3669	9272
7	0.3353	themodulator.org	475	717	1844	4944
8	0.3508	bloggersblog.com	895	247	1244	10201
9	0.3654	boingboing.net	5776	6337	1024	6183
10	0.3778	atrios.blogspot.com	4682	3205	795	3102
11	0.3885	lawhawk.blogspot.com	1862	463	1668	6597
12	0.3984	gothamist.com	6223	3324	1891	17172
13	0.4078	mparent7777.livejournal.com	25925	199	4027	47933
14	0.4163	wheelgun.blogspot.com	1174	128	262	939
15	0.4245	gevkaffeegal.typepad.com/the_alliance	302	428	333	2481
16	0.4318	anglican.tk	66	66	1377	3482
17	0.4384	micropersuasion.com	1503	2880	506	5666
18	0.4444	pajamasmedia.com	5007	141	2920	26881
19	0.4500	blogher.org	3302	412	1587	14222
20	0.4556	mypetjawa.mu.nu	1108	1733	757	3609
21	0.4611	reddit.com	2618	1940	201	1117
22	0.4661	soccerdad.baltiblogs.com	814	451	1137	4307
23	0.4711	thenoseonyourface.com/the_nose_on_your_face	400	394	349	1645
24	0.4759	ahistoricality.blogspot.com	441	87	293	805
25	0.4803	theanchoressonline.com	989	430	1597	6358
26	0.4848	americablog.blogspot.com	5786	3351	331	3950
27	0.4890	sfist.com	3068	1461	1891	13203
28	0.4931	tbogg.blogspot.com	1412	864	5567	19396
29	0.4971	horsepigcow.com	516	498	203	1220
30	0.5009	whyhomeschool.blogspot.com	513	211	205	1030
31	0.5046	daoureport.salon.com	2012	5255	177	768
32	0.5083	sisu.typepad.com/sisu	331	304	293	1968
33	0.5119	metafilter.com	5866	1277	607	13374
34	0.5151	megite.com	535	33	378	2422
35	0.5183	laist.com	2651	1259	1389	7680
36	0.5214	captainsquartersblog.com/mt	2623	6495	517	6187
37	0.5243	shakespearessister.blogspot.com	4580	2116	1386	5839
38	0.5271	blog.guykawasaki.com	218	1470	24	311
39	0.5299	tryinotocomeundone.blogstream.com	76	183	343	973
40	0.5326	bluestarchronicles.blogspot.com	180	144	283	1082
41	0.5352	googleblog.blogspot.com	294	2815	3	84
42	0.5377	theglitteringeye.com	924	377	1088	3927
43	0.5402	asterisco.paradigma.pt	2419	145	521	14280
44	0.5425	readwriteweb.com	543	1236	275	1937
45	0.5448	digbysblog.blogspot.com	1784	3553	574	3153
46	0.5470	conservativecat.com	682	284	916	3551
47	0.5491	phillyist.com	1633	800	1797	6328
48	0.5511	socialcustomer.com	279	119	122	889
49	0.5530	business2.blogs.com/business2blog	635	343	132	1801
50	0.5549	gatewaypundit.blogspot.com	2677	3172	1146	6829
51	0.5567	crooksandliars.com	2426	2578	1275	6147
52	0.5584	rightwingnews.com	1975	1700	891	8478
53	0.5600	10000birds.com	160	72	46	217
54	0.5617	radar.oreilly.com	647	1219	160	2699
55	0.5632	cowboyblob.blogspot.com	1208	173	145	379
56	0.5648	business-opportunities.biz	1419	450	224	4773
57	0.5663	dcist.com	2873	1995	1346	8049
58	0.5678	headrush.typepad.com/creating_passionate_users	159	1149	45	313
59	0.5693	legitgov.org	2810	10835	473	562
60	0.5707	whataboutclients.com	518	80	220	1252
61	0.5722	roughtype.com	365	1074	101	455
62	0.5736	tuaw.com	3656	0	368	34518
63	0.5750	aude91.canalblog.com	375	81	67	208
64	0.5764	thelondonfog.blogspot.com	953	117	192	861
65	0.5777	bostonist.com	1080	944	1402	5001
66	0.5791	seattlest.com	2562	1326	1367	8063
67	0.5805	austinist.com	3113	1086	1199	7531
68	0.5818	indianwriting.blogspot.com	419	49	48	451
69	0.5831	powerlineblog.com	2081	2362	179	1487
70	0.5844	firedoglake.blogspot.com	655	1163	232	1496
71	0.5857	elisson1.blogspot.com	736	257	200	737
72	0.5869	rhymeswithright.mu.nu	1325	329	1050	5583
73	0.5882	ragnell.blogspot.com	403	170	121	689
74	0.5894	pulverblog.pulver.com	934	445	313	5653
75	0.5906	mry.blogs.com/les_instants_emery	558	49	91	1347
76	0.5918	gapingvoid.com	1156	905	235	1752
77	0.5929	catymology.blogspot.com	114	56	41	169
78	0.5941	hughhewitt.com	1330	1234	500	2468
79	0.5953	lifehacker.com	4436	2420	927	16658
80	0.5964	jordoncooper.com	619	264	229	2189
81	0.5976	econbrowser.com	263	349	210	1647
82	0.5987	socialitelife.com	4455	1677	1400	10616
83	0.5998	gatesofvienna.blogspot.com	894	1090	404	1892
84	0.6009	nevillehobson.com	578	0	384	4142
85	0.6019	waxy.org/links	836	2093	97	289
86	0.6030	aliferestarted.blogspot.com	77	52	95	387
87	0.6040	volokh.com	2400	1150	489	2047
88	0.6051	library.coloradocollege.edu/steve	154	33	85	459
89	0.6061	drsanity.blogspot.com	963	1419	807	2269
90	0.6071	mudvillegazette.com	770	1351	579	2902
91	0.6081	saysuncle.com	1992	1	552	4025
92	0.6091	privacydigest.com	1819	683	543	14208
93	0.6100	londonist.com	2624	844	868	6308
94	0.6110	shanghaiist.com	1359	1656	1292	5442
95	0.6120	markshea.blogspot.com	3109	551	413	1750
96	0.6129	singleservecoffee.com	442	325	237	885
97	0.6139	jeremy.zawodny.com/blog	279	617	84	550
98	0.6148	scienceblogs.com	4261	1614	3168	15324
99	0.6157	basicthinking.de/blog	2084	410	432	15046
100	0.6166	scobleizer.wordpress.com	1144	757	406	2487

A commenter, Zman Biur, at Soccer Dad said:

“if there’s a best day to read blogs to maximize the information your getting, it’s Friday.”

Who has time to read blogs on Friday? Must be an anti-Semitic algorithm!

“if you only have time to read 100 blogs”

Who on earth has time to read 100 blogs?

Why, bloggers have the time, Mr. Zman Biur.

And commenters also, who like to hang around and share their thoughts but don’t want to deal with the upkeep of a blog. It’s kind of like letting your neighbors kids in to play occasionally because they like your neat “stuff”, but you can send them home when you feel like it.

What I did notice however, was that study said the best time to read blogs is on Friday. It’s been my experience our traffic drops off then. First, lots of people skip work on Friday. Second, we must have more Jewish readers getting ready for Shabbat than I realized.

Cool!

NOTE: I recognize that being on this list does not mean we're actually in the top 100 in virtual reality. What these students were establishing was the most efficient way to use your blog-reading time. That's what this list signifies.

12 comments:

Conservative Swede said...: LGF didn't make the list.; 10/28/2007 9:07 PM
atheling2 said...: Gratified to see The Anchoress made it.

The Daily Kos isn't there, and neither is the Drudge Report...

Blue Star Chronicles??? Wow! Way to go Beth!; 10/28/2007 9:52 PM
Indigo Red said...: The smart students should have checked the addresses before publishing their report. #3 and #88 are not there anymore.

However, I'm still at the same old address, writing the same old boring stuff.

I come to the Gate because it's good writing and you all have lots of stuff to disseminate from parts of the world most think don't matter.; 10/29/2007 12:26 AM
Gordon Pasha said...: For whatever the list is worth, I am pleased that LGF and HotAir didn't make it. They are heading full tilt down the Danrather Holier-than-thou path.

And commenters also, who like to hang around and share their thoughts but don’t want to deal with the upkeep of a blog. It’s kind of like letting your neighbors kids in to play occasionally because they like your neat “stuff”, but you can send them home when you feel like it.

I no longer maintain my blog because the usefulness/danger ratio is too low in my profession, and because I'm so much less talented than so many others.

That said, this will be the last of my infrequent comments. I wasn't aware that non-bloggers' comments were an annoyance.; 10/29/2007 9:42 AM
Dymphna said...: Mr. Pasha--

Reading over what you excerpted--

And commenters also, who like to hang around and share their thoughts but don’t want to deal with the upkeep of a blog. It’s kind of like letting your neighbors kids in to play occasionally because they like your neat “stuff”, but you can send them home when you feel like it. --

I can see how it sounds. Infelicitous to say the least. It was *supposed to be* funny. In no way did I mean it to be an exclusion of anyone.

I guess a better way to put it would be that the neighbor's children come in to play because they like your stuff and then they leave when they get bored.

We only started blogging because our comments at Belmont Club were too long and I thought we were hogging the thread sometimes.

I checked and your profile is no longer available so there is no way to apologize or explain. Since you won't be back, there's simply no way to let you know it came out wrong.

However, if you took my comment that way, others obviously might do the same (as Peter Drucker said, "communication is the act of the recipient" so it doesn't matter what I *meant*. What matters is what you took from my comment).

I sure don't want this faux pas to spread...; 10/29/2007 11:02 AM
Dymphna said...: Indigo red (interesting nic...I'm trying to imagine it)--

Are you kidding? Go thru all one hundred links??? Heck, we're way overdue to houseclean our own blogroll. Anyway, who knows how long it took them to put that table together...

Right now, we do it on a catch-as-catch can basis -- i.e., if I click on someone and the link brings me to an advertising page then that's a clue the blog is no longer registered, so we delete it.

Hey, now that I think of it...did *you* go through all one hundred clicks?

Hmmm... would you like to go through our blogroll? I'll be your friend...

No, seriously, I could send you a gift certificate from Amazon. We have their credit card, which I use for all our expenses. When you get enough points, they send out gift certificates. Now that the future Baron is staying here until grad school and eating us out of house and home I get more certificates than I used to...

(before any of y'all scold me about my irresponsible parenting...yes, he *does* pay room and board, in the form of one week's paycheck a month).

So anyway, are you game for this job?; 10/29/2007 11:14 AM
Dymphna said...: Conservative Swede and aethling2 --

The fact is that both those blogs are way bigger than we are.

The students weren't looking at size, they were looking at nodes and examined the blogosphere as a cascade, which is a clever way of doing it. This method was premised on the "cost-efficiency" of having x time to read x blogs.

IOW, more bang for your buck.; 10/29/2007 11:19 AM
Soccer Dad said...: The students didn't make a mistake. These were rankings for 2006.

My guess about LGF and OTB (another big one that didn't make the cut) is that there was too much overlap between those an others mentioned. I don't know why that would be as both seem to be agenda setters.

Still I wonder, if you changed one or two blogs in the list how much would it affect the others? Would dropping two blogs from the list mean that you'd then have to drop, say, another 3 and then replace those with 5 different blogs? (I would assume that such a dynamic would occur, but can't prove it.) Or would you be able just to remove two and replace those two without any further loss of efficiency?; 10/29/2007 11:25 AM
Dymphna said...: Soccer Dad--

You were too modest in this comment: you failed to mention that *you* made the list twice.

The first time in the Watcher of Weasels Council, and the second time for your own blog.

That is pretty cool.; 10/29/2007 11:36 AM
Doc Merlin said...: This is because LGF and drudge are both accumulators, whereas other blogs on this list generate a lot of stuff.
Not that LGF doesn't generate stuff, just that they tend to be more accumulators.
Almost everything I read here, I haven't seen elsewhere or its in some obscure danish newspaper, etc.; 10/29/2007 1:55 PM
falcon_01 said...: Well gosh, I'm not there! *gasp* oh well...
LOL oh, it's just for 2006 and I hadn't started yet? yeah... that must be it...

ok, I know hardly anyone reads my blog anyway... boohoo... Maybe if I get the job in Iraq and actually have enough time to write things down...; 10/29/2007 3:12 PM
Robohobo said...: Who cares about LGF? It is an echo chamber over there anyway. And not that good a blog. I like a reading room with, you know, real content. Not some place going, "nyah! Nyah! I'm smarter than all the rest of you plebes!' like LGF seems to be stuck on doing.; 10/30/2007 12:42 AM

Sunday, October 28, 2007

So Who Are the Top 100 Blogs? Not Who I’d Have Thought

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