My take is that Technorati rankings are but one of several imperfect tools to measure a blog’s impact. The real question is whether a blog is being read by the right people, not necessarily by how many (although I’d argue that there is overlap). The “right people” of course differ depending on one’s goal for the blog in question. The challenge comes in when an unknown blog tries to get in front of these target audiences; a higher ranking can serve as an introduction.

Dan,

Would it be possible to open your comments feature to non-Blogger account holders? This is the comment I would have left on your blog:

You definitely point out some of the flaws in the “more links are better” debate. The Technorati system and others measure hard facts, i.e., how many links by how many different sites, but say little about the *reason* behind those links: Authority, agreement, disagreement, link baiting, etc. Perhaps, as Lee suggests, the number of links over time is a better indicator for measuring a blog’s impact. But what is a proper measure of time? And how can we compare one blog to another, given their different start dates and number of posts?

My take is that Technorati rankings are but one of several imperfect tools to measure a blog’s impact. The real question is whether a blog is being read by the right people, not necessarily by how many (although I’d argue that there is overlap). The “right people” of course differ depending on one’s goal for the blog in question. The challenge comes in when an unknown blog tries to get in front of these target audiences; a higher ranking can serve as an introduction.

Dan,

Would it be possible to open your comments feature to non-Blogger account holders? This is the comment I would have left on your blog:

You definitely point out some of the flaws in the “more links are better” debate. The Technorati system and others measure hard facts, i.e., how many links by how many different sites, but say little about the *reason* behind those links: Authority, agreement, disagreement, link baiting, etc. Perhaps, as Lee suggests, the number of links over time is a better indicator for measuring a blog’s impact. But what is a proper measure of time? And how can we compare one blog to another, given their different start dates and number of posts?

In the lower-middle ground, ranking doesn’t discern a quality blogger new to web authoring and on the way up from a truly awful blogger getting chastised with public airing.

I believe you are onto a key measuring factor in continued linking; the total links to unique linking site ratio.
Technorati doesn’t appear to take this into account.
Looking at 10th and 11th spot, despite the fact that one blog has 30793 links from 6513 different sites, this is outranked by another that has 18881 from 6519 different sites.

Accordingly, links from 6 more unique sites is more important than 12000 links.
I don’t buy that.

In the lower-middle ground, ranking doesn’t discern a quality blogger new to web authoring and on the way up from a truly awful blogger getting chastised with public airing.

I believe you are onto a key measuring factor in continued linking; the total links to unique linking site ratio.
Technorati doesn’t appear to take this into account.
Looking at 10th and 11th spot, despite the fact that one blog has 30793 links from 6513 different sites, this is outranked by another that has 18881 from 6519 different sites.

Accordingly, links from 6 more unique sites is more important than 12000 links.
I don’t buy that.