Why I Won't Play Blogshares
There's a new plaything filling the blogosphere and it's called Blogshares, a fantasy "stock market" simulation that uses blogs as the basis for the "companies" and links as the basis of how much a blog is valuated at. On the surface, it's a fun idea. And I have nothing against it as a game.
But, if there's anything we've learned about the egos of people who are extroverted enough to write daily and make this writing available on the Web, if there's a possibility of "gaming the system," they will.
I first saw mention of Blogshares on More Like This, Bill Humphries's blog. Bill's been doing this kind of thing longer than almost anybody (a set of bookmarks I have from 1998 has five weblogs, including Jorn Barger's Robot Wisdom, Raphael Carter's, and Bill's). I thought, "If Bill's doing this, it can't be so bad." I clicked on the link and read the description (well, after finding immediacy and how much my shares were valued at). What concerns me is that they are only tracking links to other blogs--that is, if my understanding of it is correct, a blog increases its valuation by being linked to by other blogs, with blogs that have lots of links to them providing higher value links. What's wrong with that? There's already enough of a cult of personality surrounding this medium that having a fantasy market to encourage it seems not only unnecessary, but counter-productive. I don't care to discover blogs that everyone knows about--I'd like to find some of those off-the-beaten path blogs that speak directly to my interests (like, for example, Rolling the Bones in my blogroll, which consistently has some great insight into the resurgence of the role-playing game).
I also think Blogshares itself is a passing fad, much like the movie/celebrity fantasy stock market game. There's a certain group that finds that kind of thing interesting, but if I'm going to play that kind of game, I might as well spend that time and effort with real money, where I can actually reap some benefit for my dedication.
Hi Glen!
I also have decided against the Blogshares thing and for many of the reasons you elucidated so well.
It is a dumb waste of time, and there's nothing wrong with dumb wastes of time--I'm sure there's plenty of things we all do that fit that category. But something else was bothering me about it, too, thus the reason for the entry.
Thanks for the welcome, Terrek!
Wow, very erudite. And I had just thought Blogshares looked like a dumb waste of time...
By the by, welcome to the DC Bloggers list. I've seen you on Aaron's random five list and visited a couple of time before, but now it's official- you're one of us!
Hi ya, I was off doing a bit of counter-research on the Blgshares thing. I wanted to find out why other people didn't like the idea. I was told I wasn't the only one peeved, as it were. In the process I've discoered some interesting journals, like yours here, so I guess there's a positive spin to it after all.
Nice to read ya~!
-Strixy(.com)
There's a silver lining in every share, is there? Thanks for coming by and commenting, Strixy. If there's anything the Internet does is connect like-minded people, and that is a true benefit.
Hey there, I know I'm late to the party, but I thought that I would point out that the point of the game is not actually the valuation of your blog, but instead the valuation of your portfolio. MANY people are confused about this issue because there are so many "my blog is bigger than your blog" sites out today.
Blogshares is a stock market simulation which only uses blogs as simple commodities to be bought and sold for the user's profit. It doesn't matter what the valuation of any particular blog is, since they are only vehicles to personal enrichment...with fake money of course...
Of course, bloggers being what they are, get upset about their own blog's valuation and write the game off as nothing more than "yet another ranking system", but if you divest yourself from your own blog, the game is a hell of a lot of fun!
take care!
I am playing for a while, to experience the greasiness of it, even though I detest the whole idea of the "attention economy," whose existence I think it contributes to rather than proves. It doesn't even perform the service of motivating bloggers to read other bloggers, which would be useful, since the whole thing can be done by technical analysis of graphs. I can't even discover the identity of the players who hold my shares, which might also be useful. Why both me and Nick Denton?