I inadvertently put a twist on blog tag games that makes total sense. When Chris Brogan tagged me with Aidan Hatch’s game, I added to it that you had to keep the chain alive - repost everyone who was tagged before you. This accomplishes three things:

1. Lets you see who has gone before you and how long the chain is.
2. Gives inbound link love to those before you
3. Incentivizes you to preserve the rule so that people you tag link back to you in future generations

The last time we saw this kind of link generation was with the 2000 Bloggers project, and that brought lots of link love to everyone involved. This is a classic network effect - every person who fully participates brings added value to all the other participants, and encourages future participation, just like the purchase of every fax machine makes previous buyers’ purchases more valuable.

Finally, a benefit to those social scientists among us - this lets you create trees and maps with greater ease.

The next time you play a game of blog tag, will you preserve the chain?