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TechCrunch blogger Michael Arrington started playing Alexadex (a website stock-exchange game based on Alexa) in February. He blogged his first day (using an undisclosed referral URL! OMG scandal!), promising to buy stock in web sites just before blogging about them, then profiting (in pretend money) from his own TechCrunch Effect.

Mike traded for about a week, and dropped his account. Michael, consider this an open letter: Won't you please start a new insider trading spree? Those of us who followed your first moves are dying to see how much money Pretend Mike can make — not that we'd unfairly extrapolate how much Real Mike makes from his startup cheerleading.

And just to goad Mike, Valleywag has its own Alexadex account, under the name Wag. We'll play down and dirty — insider trading mandatory. This Alexadex season is two months long, Mike. Let's see who burns to the "top gainers" chart first.

Disclosure: I packed all these links with referral codes. You're making Pretend Valleywag rich.

Alexadex [Alexadex.com]
TechCrunch on Alexadex [Alexadex]
Valleywag on Alexadex [Alexadex]
The Web 2.0 "Stock" Market [TechCrunch]