So many posts, so little time

When it comes to felinosphere rankings, we have it from the Father of All Carnivals of the Cats, Laurence Simon himself: "Tiny [above plotting her next food-procuring move] and Baby rule."

"Which blogs should we read to avoid missing important stories?" asks a team of Carnegie-Mellon researchers in an award-winning paper -- "Cost-effective Outbreak Detection in Networks" -- that's been heating up the 'sphere. We first got wind of the story a couple of days ago in a link to the study in our Site Meter stats. Clicking over, we were quite surprised and not a little skeptical to find our own blog ranked #32 in a list of the 100 "most informative blogs." From the Introduction:

Our  goal is to select a small set of blogs . . . which "catch" as many cascades (stories) as possible. A naive, intuitive solution would be to select the big, well-known blogs. However, these usually have a large number of posts and are time-consuming to read. We show that, perhaps counterintuitively, a more cost-effective solution can be obtained by reading smaller but higher quality blogs, which our algorithm can find.

So many posts, so little time. The plot thickened this morning when the Site Meter revealed a trickling of visitors from the estimable Charlston Daily Mail columnist Don Surber's blog:

I might not be able to get my swelled head in the car today after reading that my blog is No. 2 in best reads . . . This is according to researchers at Carnegie-Mellon University who used algorithms and other stuff that I don’t understand to determine which blogs are the most efficient use of one’s time.

Don -- may we call you Don? -- had linked the Top 40 of the Top 100, and there we were, sitting pretty at #32 [Bats eyelashes]. Meanwhile, Instapundit at #1 lent further weight to the whole enterprise with his usual concise, terse, pithy prose:

CARNEGIE-MELLON RANKS THE MOST INFORMATIVE BLOGS, and their methodology is clearly sound.

As Don Surber said from his own lofty perch at #2:

Still it is fun and flattering to see one’s name ranked so highly.

Blogfriend Steve of Modulator -- AKA Noah of the Friday Ark -- weighing in at #7, emailed us this tasty tidbit:

BTW, have you checked out who is #1 on this variant of their study? No Insta... here!!

Indeed. Heh. And herewith, to save our readers time and keep 'em coming back for more, the list:

  1. Instapundit
  2. Don Surber
  3. Science & Politics
  4. Watcher of Weasels
  5. Michelle Malkin
  6. National Journal's Blogometer
  7. The Modulator
  8. BloggersBlog.com
  9. Boing Boing
10. Atrios
11. A Blog for All
12. Gothamist
13. mparent777
14. TFS Magnum
15. Alliance of Free Blogs
16. anglican.tk
17. Micropersuasion
18. Pajamas Media
19. BlogHer
20. MyPetJawa
21. Reddit
22. Soccer Dad
23. Nose on Your Face
24. Ahistorically
25. The Anchoress
26. AMERICAblog
27. sfist
28. TBogg
29. HorsePigCow
30. Why Homeschool
31. The Daou Report
32. Sisu
33. MetaFilter
34. Megite
35. LAist
36. Captain's Quarters
37. Shakesville
38. Guy Kawasaki
38. Lucy by Lucy
40. Blue Star Chronicle
41. Official Google Blog
42. The Glittering Eye
43. O Planeta Asterisco
44. Read/WriteWeb
45. Hullabaloo
46. The Conservative Cat
47. Phillyist
48. The Social Customer Manifesto
49. The Next Net
50. Gateway Pundit
51-100 below the fold

"A great list to have. I plan to visit each over time," imails Goomp, who adds:

Some blogs get tiresome because they say the same thing over and over even tho they are things that need to be said. Sisu is informative and innovative and refreshing.

Well, he IS our father. Thanks for your continuing support, Goomp.

Update: For more animals -- with and without backbones -- for your blog-reading dollar, head over to Modulator Steve's Friday Ark #162.

  51. Crooks and Liars
  52. Right Wing News
  53. 10,000 Birds
  54. O'Reilly Radar
  55. Cowboy Blog
  56. Business Opportunities Weblog
  57. DCist
  58. Creating Passionate Users
  59. Citizens For Legitimate Government
  60. What About Clients?
  61. Rough Type
  62. The Unofficial Apple Weblog
  63. Dans la cuisine d'Audinette
  64. The London Fog
  65. Bostonist
  66. Seattlest
  67. Austinist
  68. Indian Writing
  69. Power Line
  70. Firedoglake
  71. Blog d'Elisson
  72. Rhymes With Right
  73. Written World
  74. The Jeff Pulver Blog
  75. blog d'eMeRY
  76. Hugh MacLeod's gapingvoid
  77. Catymology
  78. Hugh Hewitt
  79. Lifehacker
  80. jordoncooper.com
  81. Econbrowser
  82. A Socialite's Life
  73. Gates of Vienna
  84. NevilleHobson.com
  85. Waxy.org
  86. A Life Restarted
  87. The Volokh Conspiracy
  88. See Also...
  89. Dr. Sanity
  90. Mudville Gazette
  91. www.saysuncle.com
  92. Privacy Digest
  93. Londonist
  94. Shanghaiist
  95. Catholic and Enjoying It
  96. Single Serve Coffee
  97. Jeremy Zawodny's blog
  98. ScienceBlogs
  99. Basic Thinking Blog
100. Scobleizer

Comments

[Elisson]

Personally, I think this means Carnegie Mellon oughta have their accreditation yanked.

Quite frankly, I'm not surprised sisu made the cut. You, at least, generally have something intelligent to say. On the other hand, my ridiculous site is one of the 100 most informative? Informative about what? Cats? Recipes? Vile bodily secretions?

Aw, who am I to complain? Stroking our Big Fat Egos is what all this is about, innit? And I think I'm having a stroke...

[goomp]

So little time, so much fun.

[Gayle Miller]

I know this will disappoint Elisson on some level but even though I rarely agree with his opinions, I LOVE his blog!

Deal, Elisson, deal!

[greenconsciousness]

The following is part of a speech given by Donna M. Hughes, Professor and Carlson Endowed Chairperson of the University of Rhode Island Women’s Studies Program, at last night’s feature for Islamo-Fascism Awareness Week
http://www.israpundit.com/2007/?p=6265

Phyllis Chesler's remarks at Islamic Fascists Week
http://pajamasmedia.com/xpress/phyllischesler/

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