I’m excited to announce the Earn This project that I (and my fellow Earn This writers) will be working on in 2015:

Has a nice ring, huh?

The idea is this: In 2015, Earn This will be publishing, revising, or otherwise highlighting 100 different “lists” of various shapes and sizes. In other words, the “Rank This” hub page is going to get kind of busy.

We decided to do this for a few reasons:

1) Lists are cool. They’re fun. They’re stupid but in a way that makes you want to read more. I’m somewhat obsessed with lists and rankings, and I know at least one or two other Earn This writers are.

2) Lists are enjoyable to write. I’ve had a really good time writing some of our lists posts. Recent entries that have been a lot of fun to put together include The Top 50 Disney Songs and — if you’re looking for something more scathing —  Ranking the Stories in Love Actually.

“We need to go deeper”

3) There are a lot of things I’ve been meaning to rank, but haven’t made time to do it yet. I spent most of my Earn This writing time in 2014 working on Dan’s Top 100 Everything (and, as of the publishing of this article, there are still seven entries to go despite my desire to finish by the end of the year). I strayed a few times, but mostly stuck to that series. But, now that we’re into 2015, I’ll be focusing on a wide number of lists, not just one.

4) Readers like lists. We get a lot of views and comments on our list articles. As long as we hold true to our site mantra — “taking a thoughtful look” — and keep the focus on writing, not click-bait, I think it will be a win-win-win.

5) It well help us freshen/spotlight older content. We already have a nice crop of well-written, well-thought-out list articles; some still get readers, others don’t. Either way, I’ve been meaning to revise and update some of these lists — and hopefully put remind readers these articles exist!

There are a few other reasons, but those are the biggest ones.

The lists will likely fall into three categories:

• Lists of items in large, subjective categories. Example: Top 10 Summertime Albums. I typically categorize these as Surveys or Playlists (see: “Mix This”) rather than true “lists,” but for our Year of 100 Lists, we’ll include them. These are rankings of categories that lack formal grouping or definition.
• Lists of items in well-defined categories. Example: Top 50 Relient K Songs. The classic type of countdown list: Ranking the items of some (usually) objective category — movies with a specific actor, songs by a specific artist, games for a specific console, etc.
• Lists of items in a small universe. Example: Ranking the 9 Stories in Love Actually. I usually use the wording “Ranking _____” instead of “The Top _____” because saying “The Top 5 Taylor Swift Albums” means we’re automatically including both the best and the worst; is it fair to call them the “Top” items if it’s all of them? These are often smaller, filler lists, but are a lot of fun nonetheless.

I’m excited to the coundown the crap out of anything and everything this year, and I hope you will enjoy the trip as well!

We’ll keep the list of lists updated on the “100 Year of Lists” hub page.