The PresidentialWatch08 map is composed of the 297 most visible and influential websites and blogs – out of a complete dataset of over 2000 sites – using Linkfluence’s proprietary crawl technology.
As Ethan Zuckerman writes: “The idea here is to look at linking between political blogs in only a political context, discarding other links that are outside of context.”
Protein Wisdom: Visible. Influential. Near the center of the political blogosphere. Who’da thunkit?
(h/t Memeorandum.)
oooooooooo
i lurvs social network theory.
Jeff has weight and influence.
trudat.
Which way to the Egress?
Linkfluence is sort of a dumb name. Except not sort of.
I think you mean “mass,” nishi.
I remember when the Hubble took that photo. I think they named it The Great Clusterfuck.
Looks like Known Space.
Where are the Puppetteers? And Kzin?
the # links cause positioning i think, the the size and brightness is influence….ill have to look in my textbook.
[…] from Karl to liven up a slow news night, a lovely rendering of the 297 most influential political websites. […]
[…] from Karl to liven up a slow news night, a lovely rendering of the 297 most influential political websites. […]
Actually, it’s explained under “map keys” at the site.
Interestingly, fas.org is listed as solidly conservative.
Yep, that’s right: Federation of American Scientists. Unsurprisingly, given that, Andrew Sullivan is listed as conservative as well.
More proof that God does not play dice with the blogoshere!
The map won’t load on my antedeluvian machine, so I’m guessing here: red for Conservative and blue for Prog, of course. Green for (notionally) independent and yellow for MSM and allies. What do the circles (rings) signify?
Regards,
Ric
Slart,
Andrewsullivan.com=conservative
andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com=liberal
About correct, I’d say. ;-)
Ric, presumably the circles represent Obama.
Ric,
The rings (and the green) are an artifact, afaict. The Indie sites are purple; there are only two – factcheck and rollcall
Also, the map takes a while to load in any event.
Light red = conservative “infopit” (WSJ, Drudge, NYPost)
Light blue = liberal “infopit” (the LA Times will be so proud)
Your position along the X-axis say more about where you link to (and who links to you) than where you ARE, opinion-wise speaking. So if Sully is in the red camp, that’s because more folks on the right link to him — to mock him, of course — than on the left.
Red circles and lines = Inbound links
Yellow circles and lines = Outbound links
Green circles and lines = Mutual links
Probably PW got dragged left somewhat by inbound “Pasty” links.
dicentra,
re: Sully, see #9
Time isn’t an issue, Karl. FF2 simply reports “done”, and no further Internet traffic occurs.
Of course, when Noë landed the Ark he surplused out all his computers and bought new; my machine is one of the ones he replaced, and still has a lingering scent of exotic manure. It is connected to the Internet via dialup, over a cable installed in, I believe, 1964, which goes to a central office operated by a 90s-model Ericsson exchange, which replaced the Strowger step-by-step in 1994, thence to a town whose only distinction is that it happens to be close to a splice point on the Mid-South Fiber Optic Interconnect (= US80, more or less).
It means that a lot of sites that I used to like are closed to me until I go to the shop, where I have medium-speed cable. I do persevere…
Regards,
Ric
Pretty cool…
I posted on this too. Great stuff!
Dinosaur footprints in the Brazos.
So which part is the Delta Quadrant again and how long will it take us to get back to the Federation at warp 9?
Log Cabin,
If it helps, we’re smack in the middle of the Mutara nebula.
Oh great, then we have to rely on visual contact.
(nerd alert, nerd alert!)
They seem to have left out some major blogs: PajamasMedia, Instapundit, LGF, Michelle Malkan, Hot Air, Ace of Spades..and surprise they are all– right of center, to right
Ragnell,
I found Ace, Michell Malkin, and Instapundit on it so far. There is a nice search feature if you follow the link to the site.
It’s kind of fun.
Instapundit is on there for sure — I saw it.
It’s a real problem with this type of graph; they’re really pretty when there are only 20 or 30 entities, but they become unwieldy and confusing quite rapidly with an increasing number of data points.
They really should use some kind of LOD algorithm (i.e., the default view shows only the “big fish”, with the smaller fry becoming visible as you zoom in on a specific region).
[…] A map of the political blogosphere. Thanks 2 Karl […]
Ragnell, they are all there. couldn’t find neoneocon though.
It you zoom in fully, with PW in the center, the closest neighbor is the New York Post, and theglitteringeye dot com.
SaysUncle is the closest blog I recognize…a nice gunny blogger out of Knoxville.
Well, Althouse, but I don’t read that.
But — I’m a far right racist extremist misogynist homophobe!
Shit. I knew I shouldn’t have let Peter Fonda post here.
[…] I found this by accident when something from Curt at Flopping Aces popped on Memeorandum. Apparently, the Crabitat is ranked in the top 297 political blogs by this site. (As is Flopping Aces and a bunch of other well known sites. Curt got it from Hot Air who got it from Protein Wisdom.) […]
Fixed that for you.
[…]
What? Define “influential,” then!
[…]
Oh.
<walks away muttering about setting the building on fire>
[…] got the cartographical cooties in check over at Protein about this cool ‘08 Presidential Map. I say cool because you’ll find us launching […]
So we dig in here?
Where do you want the 60, and what are my primary and FPF fields of fire, boss?
Oh. Sorry. Woolgathering….
…point the Claymores the other way, please, Johnson…
Karl (Crossposting this from Hot Air, in case you’ve moved on):
I have to wonder what data these guys were using.
In checking out some of the link-ups, I was surprised to find that they were listing Glen Greenwald at his old blog site — where he hasn’t been posting for nearly a year and a half now! Other reciprocal links for the blog I was investigating didn’t include some of what seem to me to be pretty regular crossovers.
The site was slow for me, so I didn’t get around to looking for a more detailed methodology page, but I’m suspecting that June 2008 is not the date of the political blogosphere we’re looking at, but just the date they finally got the thing up and running. I’d be interested in whether or not you think the inbounds/outbounds/reciptrocal links for Protein Wisdom seem current to you.
JM,
I think the links for PW are generally current, though I agree that their selection of blogs is not always current, as with Greenwald. See also the two different results for Andrew Sullivan noted upthread at #9.
I’m just a bit curious: What effect do/did/would Instapundit’s and Belmont Club’s move to PajamasMedia have on their ranking? I guess it would be necessary to see the map as interpreted from a point in the past, as well as the present.
As long as I’m on the subject of transitioning to PajamasMedia (sort of), while it appears innocent enough now, over time contributors’ literary independence and autonomy might be subject to influence by the powers-that-be who are “in charge.” But what do I know?
[…] upon various different attributes, and you can even zoom in to hyper magnification. According to Karl of Protein Wisdom, we’re joined by 296 other blogs out there, and given the very broad expanse of political […]
good God… I am a moderate? HEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEELLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPP
So exact where in the sky do I find this ?
It’s no use, they KNOW WHERE WE ARE!
Hey Dan! I can see your dot from here!
[…] (Hat tip: AP, who got it from Karl.) […]
Norm,
I think it likely that most of the data was compiled before the PJM moves you mentioned.
As for PJM’s influence on its writers, I have very limited contact with PJM, but I will note that Instapundit already is “one of the powers that be” of PJM, so little issue there. And AFAIK, PJM has never had any content issues with PW, which is part of the PJM “network.”