It seems like it should be really easy for an A- (or even a B- or C-) lister to game BlogShares. Just find a low-valued site, buy up all the shares, link to it, watch the price skyrocket, sell. Repeat as desired. I don’t think you’re going to run out of link-starved weblogs any time soon. Definitely not before you get bored of the whole thing.
Maybe you could even repeat the process of buy, link, sell, de-link on a single blog.
No, no, the real trick is to automate it.
1. Scrape the list of undervalued blogs to find one to link to. http://www.blogshares.com/major.php
2. Buy, buy, buy
3. Link prominently
4. Scrape to monitor price of linked blog
5. Sell, sell, sell
6. De-link
All of this can be easily automated.
I also like Dorothea’s reader’s idea of monitoring other blog trackers to pick up on blogs that might be going up in value. I like it because it relies on the fact that some crawlers are faster than others. If TechnoratiBot finds breaking news faster than BlogSharesBot, tracking Technorati is like having inside information. Better: it’s like past-posting, since the events in question have already happened, they just haven’t been reported on the stock exchange yet.
— Mark 
OK, I registered. I’m trying to claim my blog, but the markup I’m supposed to add to my page
1. is XHTML, not HTML
2. isn’t even HTML-compatible XHTML
3. contains unescaped ampersands
4. contains deprecated attributes that won’t validate under any Strict DOCTYPE
Disappointing. I wonder if the bot will accept my corrected version.
— Mark
Update: it appears to have “recognized” my corrected version of the BlogShares banner. Now to go learn something about investing. Then to do what we do every night… try to take over the world.
— Mark
I bet it didn’t recognize the banner, I think it just goes by referer. Did you see the bot come around?
BlogShares’ perspectives on cheating: “If it feels wrong or like easy money, chances are it is illegal.” http://www.blogshares.com/faq.php?cat=6
A lot like real life, really :)
— Lionfire
Bob the Angry Flower rules. I have that exact comic printed out and clipped to my cube wall.
But what’s the point of running a stock market where everyone plays nice? People use computers and automation to play the real stock market, but we shouldn’t use automation to play a virtual market? That makes no sense.
Also, assuming you’re not using cloaking or hiding tricks, what’s wrong with linking to a blog and taking stock in it? Real people will click through and see the “undervalued” site, so you are actually raising their “value”. Will all links need to come with disclaimers now?
— Mark
Apostrophe
I’ve long been in awe at the ineptitude of people when it comes to the apostrophe. One individual has gone to extraordinary lengths to promote its correct use:-
http://www.apostrophe.fsnet.co.uk/
BlogShares
Since nobody links to me*, my own blog is utterly worthless. Nevertheless, I am enjoying the whole ‘greed is good’ thing for the moment.
*Not strictly true. Many people link to me, but usually on a separate page.
FWIW, I’m willing to gift some shares of my blogs (http://dougal.gunters.org/ and http://www.gunters.org/ hint, hint) to any big league bloggers who will link to me.
Yes, I’m a BlogShares-cheating-LinkWhore. :)
And Alabama makes you send in the hardcopy form to confirm your e-file, too. Brilliant, eh?
— Dougal
Now *there’s* a business plan for the new millenium: offer “sponsored links” to blogs in exchange for shares in the blog. It’s like printing money! (Well, virtual money.) I’m in. 100 shares buys you a week on the front page, above the fold somewhere. (I won’t be able to redesign until I get home tonight.)
— Mark
Another common mistake with the apostrophe that wasn’t in the cartoon: “it’s” is never possessive, it is a contraction of “it is.”
From the cat out of the bag example…
1. It’s out of the bag. (correct)
2. It’s feet are out of the bag. (WRONG)
Insider tra^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H Err…. Gift-giving has begun ;)
— Dougal
Ditto to above ;)
— Cathy
Argh. The ‘above’ was re: gift giving. Trust me to try to cash in on this!
— Cathy
– It seems like it should be really easy for an A-
– (or even a B- or C-) lister to game BlogShares.
Jon Gales who’s currently floating around in the top 10 is hardly an A lister and he’s whipping butt.
— Raena
I should clarify, he’s not cheating.. at least not that I can see. But he’s going well. Yay the common man, or something.
— Raena
You can use whatever tactics you like as long as it doesn’t go against the spirit of the game or take advantage of published limitations of the Beta software.
Whilst on any absolute scale people with existing resources will always do better in such an economy, it’s a question how of you measure your performance.
So A-listers may well be wealthier but other individuals can always perform better on a relative scale. That said, some skilled players who are not considered A-listers are already beating the likes of Joi Ito, Marc Canter, Dave Winer and others. Most haven’t used any particular flaw in the software (admittedly some have) and just knew to pick the right horses.
There’ll be a new list of players that does measures relative performance over a month with some interesting aspects attached to it when the site goes live.
Oh the automated link scraping and linking relies on fore-knowledge of when the bot will visit. That’s a gamble but one perhaps worth making.
The BlogShares bot will never be as quick as the other measurement services because it shouldn’t be. It’s based on the notion of semi-permament network relationships as opposed to what is currently popular. Not a perfect model of course but a principalled one.
Using the other services as a research tool is a valid tactic. In the real economy, reading the business pages is a valid investment strategy as well.
On that note, there may soon be a fan-site along the lines of CBS MarketWatch.
In the same vein as Bob’s tirade against those who know not the apostrophe, Penny-arcade’s tirade against those who know not the full stop: http://www.penny-arcade.com/view.php3?date=2002-10-11&res=l
It seems rather ironic that when I first typed that up, i said “no” every time I meant “know”.
I can’t help but wonder what that “C is for Cookie” thing in the message entry form is for. Perhaps it’s cute, and hopefully it’s right as well. :) However, I do not understand it’s rightness, wrongness or otherwise.
— Iain
“Remember me” feature.
— Jesper