When talk in the blogosphere turns to advertising, many bloggers start to get a little sanctimonious.  Blogging isn’t about making money, blogging is about integrity, quality writing, and community.  I’m the last person who would argue that blogging isn’t about those things.  It’s one of the biggest things to hit human communication since the smoke signal.  But, be that as it may, a big part of why blogs are so popular is the money that can be made by placing ads on them.  Steven Hodson has posted a list he made on his blog of the top 100 ranked blogs in technorati and whether or not they use advertising.

Hodson’s summary only covers the tech related blogs in the top 100, but it is probably a pretty good indicator of practices on the A-List blogs on the whole.  His count shows that out of 34 tech blogs 21 have advertising on them.  That is a pretty high percentage, and indicative of the fact that most popular blogs have advertising.  So it seems fair to say that most A-List bloggers use advertising, as well they should.  It is they who make the blogosphere the popular place it is today, the problem, and Hodson points this out as well, is when A-Listers become incestuous and form their own little cliques, linking only to each other and locking out any new and upencoming blogs.