Andy Quayle asked (via Twitter) if anyone else was using BlogRush. Having never heard of it, I checked it out and, suitably interested, dedided to give it a shot myself.
What Is BlogRush?
It’s a traffic aggregator for your blog.
See the new BlogRush widget in my sidebar? Those are all links to other people’s blog posts, which BlogRush thinks cover some of the same bases as my own blog posts. Kind of like Google ads, but for blog referrals instead of retailers.
How Does Blog Rush Work?
That remains to be seen, since I just installed it. But, in theory, every time someone comes to this site, one of my blog posts gets pinged out into the BlogRush referral network. If I get 100 visitors a day, the BlogRush network will ping my posts through that widget 100 times.
Where it gets interesting is in the "tiered structure" of referrals: if you sign up for BlogRush by clicking on the tab below the widget (or by clicking here), my blog(s) get additional views via the BlogRush network. (And if someone signs up through your widget, we both benefit… and on and on…)
So It’s a Pyramid Scheme?
I’m not sure.
On one hand, yes, it does seem structured that way. But since the resources being aggregated are page views, not actual cash, it somehow seems more benevolent, no?
On the other hand, it could easily become a tool for spammers, so I’m very interested to see how BlogRush combats that.
And, lastly, I have no idea how this applies to RSS views. If someone reads my blog posts in a reader and never actually visits the site… does that register as a "visit"?
It’s all food for thought, but I’m interested in seeing how it plays out. I’m also interested in seeing how accurate the widget aligns other blog posts with mine. Semantic web, here we come…
