Dooce.com

@Dooce

Children: Two daughters

Sometimes referred to as Dooce, sometimes referred to as the ‘Queen of the Mommy Bloggers,’ Heather Armstrong has accumulated a legion of fans and an influence that is felt far beyond the blogosphere since starting Dooce.com in 2002 (for which she was fired from her job as a web designer). Armstrong has amassed over 1.565 million Twitter followers to date and says that there are around 100,000 visitors to her blog daily. Some estimate that she making as much as $1 million dollars a year from ad revenue alone (Armstrong also does speaking engagements and writes books).

And if you are still doubting Armstrong’s relevance consider this oft-told tale: she bought a Maytag washing machine in 2009, and after expressing being unhappy with it on her blog and via Twitter the company delivered a new one to her door and donated one in her name to a charity. And that’s just one in a string of examples of Armstrong’s digital power.

Armstrong told the New York Times about this influence in 2011: “There was a discussion about my sense of entitlement and my narcissism. Do I think I can rule the world with my finger on Twitter? And why don’t I ever use my power for good? Or give back to my community?” Of course backlash has only been good for Armstrong, who says the attention has only grown her audience.