Blowing the whistle

In my recent post, Referee in a catfight, commenter Joe Albero smugly brags that Salisbury News has "always" been in the top 10 since becoming involved with the Blognetnews website. Unfortunately, Joe's a little bit incorrect in that rash assertion because I have tracked the numbers since the Influence Ranking's inception in June 2007. And the numbers don't lie - there was a period of several weeks last fall when Joe's site was outside the top 10 and one week it wasn't even ranked. (On the other hand, I can correctly note that only two sites have been ranked in the top 20 each week since the ratings were introduced - mine and Brian Griffiths'.)

The other factoid I think is worth pointing out was following up on ShoreThings' note about the conservative and liberal blog rankings. Joe can only dream about the streak of #1 ratings my readers and commentors have allowed me and my humble little monoblogue to compile in the conservative blog rankings - how about 14 times in 16 weeks?

While I hesitate to cast myself anywhere close to William F. Buckley, the comparison of National Review vs. National Enquirer comes to mind when I compare my site to Joe's. Two different styles for two different audiences. (And we both read each other's sites for different reasons too.) I just didn't want to leave the loose end too long since I took my short vacation so soon after the catfight post came out.

So I ask the indulgence of my readership in setting this straight and thank them again for helping me to achieve the solid record I've compiled thus far. Because I did this post so late, you may get three today as it's SotW night as well.