Canada’s Top 25 Political Blogs – August
There’s a lot of change on this list this month. I’ll blame the summer. A lot of big sites have seen drops in their Page Rank or traffic – and so didn’t make the list.
I correlated the list with Technorati and the results came out the same. I refined this thing again to kick off any site that gets less than a third of its traffic from Canada.
Up till now, I’ve deliberately excluded my blog from the rankings. Though honestly it’s been in about 20th place for months. I’ve also left Michael Geist out from the rankings because his blog seems like a single-issue site to me.
This month, Geist is in the rankings. I’m the only one who considers his a single-issue site. But as a sop to myself for giving in on that, I’ve put my blog in the rankings. A lot of links last month, but the biggest from SDA and Little Green Footballs.
I was reading some person who shall remain nameless challenge the validity of this list. Fair play and that, it’s not hard science. But then he claimed that he had the number 2 site in Canada with about half of SDA’s traffic. The post in which he said that linked to this blog and had 5 click throughs to my site. This month I also put up a puff post comparing blog traffic to newspaper circulation. Looking at that, SDA is Canada’s 36th largest newspaper, beating out LeDevoir. Kate linked to that on her site. That got 1,864 clicks through to my site. So…. to that person claiming that they’re the number 2 site – I’d recommend checking their stats counter and consider looking into Google Analytics.
I’ve got links from every site on this list at one point or another. And the number of clicks through matches closely to the site’s ranking.
If you want to put this list on your site, here’s the html for the list you see in the side bar. It’s a .txt file. The small version of the ‘top 25′ logo is here.
Right so, here are the rankings for August, 2008. Explanation at the top of the page.:
1 Michael Geist | Pr 7 | Alexa: 231,517 | –
2 Small Dead Animals | Pr 6 | Alexa: 170,874 | JR 5
3 Steyn on Line | Pr 6 | Alexa: 209,973 | JR 1
4 Matthew Good.org | Pr 6 | Alexa: 236,44 | JR 2
5 Daimnation | Pr 6 | Alexa: 404,662 | JR 3
6 Ezra Levant | Pr 5 | Alexa: 165,281 | JR 4
7 Five Feet of Fury | Pr 5 | Alexa: 187,422 | JR 10
8 Bow. James. Bow. | Pr 5 | Alexa: 264,478 | –
9 The Shotgun Blog | Pr 5 | Alexa: 317,970 | JR 13
10 A Dime a Dozen Political Blog | Pr 5 | Alexa: 319,702 | –
11 Ghost of a Flea | Pr 5 | Alexa: 340,587 | JR 12
12 Genxat40 | Pr 5 | Alexa: 361,420 | JR 6
13 Canadian Cynic | Pr 5 | Alexa: 376,707 | JR 7
14 Abandoned Stuff | Pr 5 | Alexa: 389,627 | JR 8
15 Dawg’s Blog | Pr 5 | Alexa: 475,847 | JR 25
16 Bene Diction Blogs On | Pr 5 | Alexa: 552,888 | JR 14
17 Warren Kinsella | Pr 5 | Alexa: 553,823 | JR 24
18 Garth Turner | Pr 5 | Alexa: 658,191 | JR 9
19 Scott’s DiaTribes | Pr 5 | Alexa: 747,906 | –
20 Free Mark Steyn | Pr 5 | Alexa: 809,379 | JR 16
21 Blazing Cat Fur | Pr 5 | Alexa: 939,404 | –
22 Big City Lib Strikes Back | Pr 5 | Alexa: 946,301 | JR 15
23 Angry in the Great White North | Pr 5 | Alexa: 988,106 | JR 11
24 Marginalized Action Dinosaur | Pr 4 | Alexa: 239,227 | JR 22
25 Stage Left | Pr 4 | Alexa: 497,496 | –
Robert: ” I hope this isn’t counter intuitive to you – but both Geist and SDA get the majority of their traffic from Canada. In fact the people on either side of you on the list get as much American traffic (relatively speaking)as does SDA.
SDA doesn’t have impossible stats.”
Why do you hope that?
When I get a link from SDA, my American readers spike at least as much as Canadian readers (from memory). Next time she links to you, maybe make a mental note of what you see.
I can’t say where Geist gets most of his traffic, but I’d guess Boing Boing, Slashdot.org, and North American blogs play a huge role in his traffic numbers.
And I didn’t say “impossible”, I used “seemingly” on purpose. Yes, Kate’s good at kicking ant hills, getting published by the Nat. Post, CBC, and getting noticed.
Saskboy
August 7, 2008 at 12:46 am
You sure you got you’re handle spelled right there daBeauZo?
Jim R
August 7, 2008 at 1:26 am
I thought not. Look straight ahead and follow my finger.
Jim R
August 7, 2008 at 1:27 am
“You sure you got you’re handle spelled right”
Good Christ. Come on, Jim, I’ll get you some suicide wings at Swarthy’s. You’re getting tired.
Dr.Dawg
August 7, 2008 at 2:29 am
Yah, I just took a look at deBeauxOs’s blog and my diagnosis is unshakable. It’s Bush Derangement Syndrome or BDS.
Oh, Louise. Don’t be so stupid.
Ti-Guy
August 7, 2008 at 2:33 am
You’re getting tired.
…
Don’t be so stupid.
I tell ya, that Dawg Guy is a riot! I haven’t seen mots that bon since the bulbal was around!!
Sally
August 7, 2008 at 2:55 am
The spelling was correct Dawg. You’re just sluring the pronounciation. Now, look straight ahead…..
Jim R
August 7, 2008 at 3:47 am
Whatever you have to say against someone like Stageleft or Dr. Dawg, 15th and 25th place in a field of possibly hundreds certainly does not befit the definition of loser.
Robert, you might consider expanding the list to the top 50 so that more bloggers out there feel the link love. :-)
James Bow
August 7, 2008 at 5:03 am
Top 50?! Do you know how long it takes to do 25? Hours. And honestly, most blogs are just terrible. I couldn’t bear it.
Robert
August 7, 2008 at 5:07 am
My satirical blog http://www.onwardjames.blogspot.com covers some politics, foreign affairs and street problems. Perhaps some of the blog readers might be compelled enough to comment. Furthermore, I am somewhat pleased that the HRC gave in, but the commissions are still in operation beyond their mandates. The special interest groups seem to be getting what they want including from the taxpayers media.
Edmund Onward James
August 7, 2008 at 2:38 pm
Incidentally, lest we get too hung up on the prominence of our numbers, note this: in terms of Alexa ranking and Google Page Rank, we are ALL beaten, save for Michael Geist, by this website. Sort of puts our scribblings into perspective, doesn’t it? :=)
James Bow
August 12, 2008 at 12:10 am
Not to mention James, that the biggest blog in Canada may actually be a knitting blog Yarn Harlot.
Saskboy
September 3, 2008 at 2:04 am
I usually don’t write about politics, but you might consider looking at another angle as well. I’ve been writing about it at http://www.wisewomaninwoods.blog.ca and am in the process of moving to http://www.astromoon.wordpress.com. Check out what astrology has to say about each of the candidates as the Moon affects them every other day!
sherrieh
September 30, 2008 at 9:51 pm
Fallen off the list entirely….
Which reminds us all not to let our traffic drop for a couple of days due to a DCMCIA complaint on another sub-domain.
But here is an idea, one more time, why not set up a statcounter.com account and register each of the contenders and ask them to put the code on their sites.
It is not entirely accurate but it certainly beats Alexa and Technorati.
I fear Garth would smoke a lot of us simply on the basis of the traffic a comment there sends to my site; but a statcounter.com count would be clean and without the issues surrounding Google and Alexa.
Jay Currie
August 5, 2009 at 6:53 am
Jay – FYI: this is the list for August – 2008. I’m working on the August, 2009 version right now.
Robert Jago
August 6, 2009 at 4:45 am
Proving, beyond a doubt, that I am just as dumb as my dog thinks I am….Sorry, carry on.
Jay Currie
August 6, 2009 at 4:56 am