This whole thing is a pretty fascinating insight into a whole other corner of the internet ecosystem:

> For more than a decade, one of the most rewarding blueprints for making money online was to “start a blog."

Then:

> These hundred authority sites and blogs were chosen back in 2022 as they appeared in “bloggers who make six figures” roundups that the entire creator economy circulated as evidence that the model was real and profitable. [...] If you tried to start a blog between roughly 2015 and 2022, most probably you read blog income reports as they were the proof of concept and held up to a generation of aspiring small publishers as this is what winning looks like, and you can do it too.

It's the blog/SEO equivalent of today's TikTok influencer culture.