Gaming The Ecosystem

A short while ago I received an email from a younger blogger who wanted to know how they could improve their ranking within the Truth Laid Bear ecosystem. I explained to them that as I understood it the system is based upon the number of other blogs that link to you. So there are a couple of methods of trying to improve your stature.

One of those is to try and game the system. That is, you can try and become a team member of one of the communities in which all community members link to each other. That is a pretty simple way to improve your ranking quite quickly. The other alternative is to do your best to provide consistent and compelling content. Over time other bloggers will link to things that they find to be of interest and your ranking will improve.

Don't get me wrong. I like the ecosystem. I have steadily progressed from being a microbe to an adorable rodent and may even one day become a higher being. Who knows.

7 comments:

Soccer Dad said...

You are exactly right; the ecosystem is based (almost exclusively) on incoming links. That's why I'm a marsupial despite averaging only 150-200 hits most of the time and other more visited blogs are still flappy birds.

Take a look at some J-bloggers
Jack
Canonist
Renegade
Rubin
Elder
Ortho
Ezzie
me
Actually given your links and ranking you should be at least a bird if not a marsupial.

Jack Steiner said...

I once was a Marsupial, but that was prior to NZ's readjustment. Assuming that things stay close to where they are at I expect to become an MM again this year.

Soccer Dad said...

whoops, rodents are above birds.
You're at 2335 now. Get under 2000 to be a marsupial. But the emphasis is on the links not visits.
Another way to get that attention is to pay attention to other bloggers and bring interesting info to their attention.

Anonymous said...

The whole thing is dumb, IMO, but still I check it to find out who's linking to me--seems to be more accurate and updated than other who-links sites. I know peeps who are rodents or whatever just cuz of those mutual listing things, even though they barely have any visitors compared to me. What's the point of that?

Jack Steiner said...

SD,

Good ideas.

Paula,

I am always curious to see who is linking to who. It is kind of fun.

JJ said...

I can't even get to the microbe level- which is strange, because sometimes I see VERY new bloggers with hardly anyone linking to them and they're in the ecosystem! I guess I'm not destined to be any sort of animal :-(

Jack Steiner said...

RR,

This may sound silly, but have you registered at TTLB?

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