A fair number of god-bloggers have disagreed with me over the past few years about my stance that there aren’t “A” list god-bloggers and my belief that there shouldn’t be.
I’d not thought in terms of “A” listers until I saw Dr. Mark Byron bring it up over a year ago.

I concede.
Joe Carter of Evangelical Outpost has been the final blogger to help change my mind. We’ve had an interesting discussion in the comments below.

I realize I don’t want to see “A” listers in this sub-division for perhaps all the right reasons.
But it doesn’t matter what I want. I’ve always known weblogs are their own phenomenon. I’ve known that the media would pick up and utilize weblogs, and even exploit them. As a media person I see the good and the bad in that happening. Blogs are still evolving. Technically things are improved from a few years ago and will continue to. The social networking is more understood.
The commerical aspects are being looked at for those that chose to go that direction.

As I look at my discussion with Joe I also realize that my own experiences with US pundits who want to be movers and shakers have coloured my thinking, shaken my confidence at times and left me sadder, but I hope, wiser.

For now, the US remains the number one player in the blogging world.
And for now 65% of interaction on the web is in English.
That is changing.
Blogging is a fast game.
We know on average that most people that attempt it last under six months.
We know from Perseus and Technorati roughly how many blogs are active and that they bring in from 4 to 7 percent of online readership. We know the percentage of internet users looking for spiritual information.
We know blogging is continuing to grow.
In the god-blog sector, there will always be holy huddles. It’s a given, because we are human. And there will be some who reach far beyond their cultural, social, political and faith experiences.
I’m bringing forward a few of Joe’s comments and the literal and figurative use of ‘international.’

I think you focus on the international aspect a bit too much. For example, I live in Dallas, Texas and a quick search of blogs in this area shows over 500 of them. Yet I don’t read any of them. I do, however, read this blog, which is written by a Canadian. I, like most people, prefer to read blogs that I find interesting. No one is ignoring a blog simply because it is written by someone in Croatia. If they write about issues that are relevant to Christians and/or the world community then they will find an audience.

Perhaps Joe is correct.
Internationality is a personal pleasure, and remains so.
It isn’t everyone’s cup of tea.
As god-bloggers, no matter what branch of Christianity we come from, we acknowledge one head of the body. Whatever gifts, skills or sense of calling any of us bring to this meduim, we all have a place. Whether we allow each other to have that place is entirely up to us. How we learn to allow others that place is part of the blogging experience. If we have “A” listers, may they be as wise as serpents and as gentle as doves. For they will indeed influence many.

“A” list is really hard to define. It will remain more than hits simply because of the medium. The media and politics are going to shape blogging as a whole, there is no getting away from that reality. Some will embrace that.

Have you ever watched the British parliament on TV? The first time I saw them all grumbling and shouting I was wondering what the heck was going on. At first I thought it was incredibly rude until someone told me that was just a part of their political tradition.

In America, the tradition is to contend fiercely for your views while treating your political party like your favorite sports team. Most of what appears to be hateful behavior is mostly just heat generated from the American way of political argument. Is it the right way? I sure hope not because it is damned silly. But for better or worse that is the “American way.”

I agree Joe, and I continue to encourage other pundits in the US to follow your example of showing some grace and trying to meet those of us outside your country half-way.
Most people have enough sense to walk away from a bad experience with a blogger or bloggers and ideologies, some of us have to get knocked down more than once before we get it.:^)
As I say this, I think of some US god-blog pundits I have great respect for.
I respect them, not just because they are good thinkers and learners, but because I can know them by their fruit. This medium gives us that opportunity.
The media will tend to focus on the political, economic and technical sectors of blogging. What will the religious media focus on?

The conversation Joe and I are having has been held and is being held in all corners of the god-blogosphere. The Revealer moderated the Religion and the Media discussion at Bloggercon. The emerging church blogs from all sectors of Christianity struggle, discuss and define this complexity more than most of us - wrestling with paradigms of leadership and celebrity.

So what make an “A” lister?
How will the media represent bloggers?
I don’t know.
I’m getting a pretty good picture of how blogs represent the media.:^)

*****
The demographics of god-blogs remain underexplored.
To the best of my knowledge only three studies have been done.
Dialog: Breaking the Bubble
Tim Bednar: White Paper
The god-blog demographics

To the best of my knowledge Who Links Who is the only list other than the Blogdom of God that tracks links. WLW was never meant to be about who is at the top, and many top notch god-bloggers aren’t part of it anymore. I don’t know that St. Blog’s has ever had a ranking system. The Blogdom heads say it wasn’t set up to rank others either, it is an aggregator.

Personally, I think education should have very little to do with the status of a blogger. Advanced degrees are certainly noteworthy accomplishments but they do not automatically make someone an expert on a subject, much less an interesting writer. Because of the nature of academia, most people with PhDs have a very narrow field of expertise. I prefer the well-rounded generalists who is open to discussing a broad range of topics.

We bring our personal tastes, culture and wants into blogging perhaps more than any other form of communication online including ICQ’s and gaming.
We form core communities and learn from each other, as we see when What If I Stumble looks up to another blogger.

The comment in question?

“In the blogosphere, the representative God blogger seems to have been Martin Roth. If there is one person who has succeeded Martin Roth, that one person is Dr. Adrian Warnock…….Dr. Warnock is a force among God blogs.

The reason I called Dr. Warnock the successor of Martin Roth? If I recall correctly…right before I began blogging 4 months ago, I typed in “Christian” and “blog” into Google. I found Martin Roth’s seemingly-defunct blog. Martin Roth’s blog led me to blogs4god.com which, in turn, led me to the Blogdom of God. The Blogdom of God finally led me to Dr. Adrian Warnock.

Dr. Warnock seems to be the administrator of the Blogdom of God alliance on The TTLB Blogosphere Ecosystem. As Bene Diction says, there’s no “A list” in the God blog subdivision of the blogosphere and there shouldn’t be one. The fact remains, though, that Dr. Warnock is the administrator of the Blogdom of God. Doesn’t that mere fact make Dr. Warnock a force aming God blogs?

I don’t see media and culture as a war, and therefore I don’t see bloggers arming other bloggers. I see weblogs as a growing, maturing, learning adventure, and as a place to walk along side. As new bloggers find their place and find others to look up to, I hope they find who and what they are looking for.

And when we get to full of ourselves Quantum Tea has the ideal reminder. Blog on!

Update: What if I Stumble has contributed more to this discussion and Dr. Mark Byron has weighed with a well thought out and heart felt post, while acknowledging pundit bloggers tend to get more attention.
It’s like delinking - it happens but I don’t have to be happy about it.
In conceding, I have no problem in being wrong or changing a viewpoint, but I’m finding it hard to shake a sadness at what is. Bloggedy blog encourages us to acknowledge stratification and parallel universes.:^)