Noblesse Oblige In The Blogosphere

I have to recount an argument ... an argument I lost I guess. That's the beauty of a blog, you can always come back, restage the argument and win! You always win arguments on your blog, where you don't have to listen to anyone else!

Just kidding!

Just kidding!

Feel free to blog and disagree with me.

Here's the argument: I noticed with some surprise this fact at danah boyd's blog post at Corante about the Top 100 List:

I was also fascinated that most of the mommy bloggers that i met at Blogher link to Dooce (in Top 100) but Dooce links to no one. This seems to be true of a lot of topical sites - there’s a consensus on who is in the “top” and everyone links to them but they link to no one.

To be fair, there are many top bloggers besides Dooce without blogrolls.

I argued that since blogging is about BUILDING COMMUNITY, and I found that the Mommy Bloggers to my mind (perhaps I was wrong) are all about building community -- they are literally making community MEMBERS aren't they?!? -- that it's unusual that the top Mommy Blogger doesn't return the favor and link to people who read her blog.

There is a notion of NOBLESSE OBLIGE -- here's the definition -- it is the responsibility of those of high rank, power or nobility to be generous -- literally from the French "noblesse" nobility (being the queen) "oblige" obligates one. Nobility and rank obligates you to do selfless, generous acts.

Is it not generous of those of "high rank" in the blogosphere to blogroll someone?

My colleagues disagreed with me. They thought I was wrong. What the hell.