Rankism and the Blogosphere
Since media structures theorist Jon Garfunkel has been in town, I decided to take a look at how the concept of rankism is being applied to the blogosphere. There’s some impressive brainpower at work. Rankism is coming up in relation to link hierarchies (also here), tag clouds, the attention economy, P2P, social media, metrics, wikis, network theory, paramedia, and online activism.
Since the Internet is an evolving structure, there are abundant opportunities to identify and hopefully stem rankism. It’s good to see that the conversation is indeed happening.
Rankism is as much a part of the blogosphere as any aspect of real life. On the surface it might seem that the blog arena is the ultimate meritocracy: popularity contingent upon the appeal of your content.
Separating yourself from the bottom of the pack requires talent. But once elevated to the middle it’s like highschool. How does one become popular or cool in highschool? Answer, you’re accepted by people more popular than you - enhancing you’re own “coolness” factor.
So it becomes about networking and getting added to blogrolls with mojo. On Daily Kos, a “Kossack” enjoys an automatic entry to the higher plateau whether they’re any good or not. The same personalities have their diaries recommended regardless of their quality. Other well crafted pieces slide down the memory hole. A Kossack who branches out on their own are automatically added to the prestigious Daily Kos blogroll. Are they superior to the other political blogs? Not particularly.
One reason I admire Mary Scott O’Connor of My Left Wing is because she actively promotes smaller blogs who make a contribution. Mostly though the blogosphere resembles the elusive quest to be popular or land that awesome high paying job. Getting ahead in a world of rankism is about who you know, not what you know. That’s true in the blog world too.
On the bright side I’ve learned that even us little bloggers can make a difference and inform a surprising number of people. I don’t know if rankism in the blogworld can be stemmed. But one must preservere within it if they hope to make the contribution they seek in the marketplace of ideas.
And feel free to add me to your blogroll!
Intrepid Liberal Journal
Comment by Intrepid Liberal Journal — April 27, 2006 @ 6:10 pm