Local Government TV

Thursday, May 01, 2008

Some Blogging Stats

I never realized until last night that other bloggers pay such close attention to the readership here. According to a flustered Mad as Bats, aka Warren Kirkner, aka Kirk Warren, aka Dr. Blogger, this is a "fuckin' two cent blog read by you, moldoman, and ten buddies sitting around in a circle jerk." An equally irate Chris Casey claims "it's the same two dozen people reading each other and trolling for comments 30 times a day."

Is somebody jealous?

I don't often discuss my blogging stats, and usually only do so in reply to a question. Actually, last month was my best month since I began blogging. I had 18,858 unique visits, which amounts to 628 visits per day. On weekends, the traffic drops considerably. During the last month, there were 38,428 page views.

The average length of each visit is 4 minutes 44 seconds. So far, I've had 250,429 visits since I installed the sitemeter. Seventy-five per cent of this blog's visitors are within a 1,000 mile radius. Ninety-eight per cent are from the U.S., and for some reason, one per cent is from Mexico.

This is peanuts in the big picture. This is not even among the top 100,000 blogs rated by Technorati. Looks like I'm going to have to declare a few more blog wars.

9 comments:

  1. What is the big deal about the BNN Rankings? I've noticed that some blogs have these huge icons with their BNN rank # displayed prominently and proudly front and center. According to BNN my blog is rated, on a scale of 1-10, as a 1 or what they have deemed as "really terrible." Gee thanks and who cares what you think.

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  2. I've challenged BNN before (remember... you even commented about it, lol). Truth be told, until they explain how the rankings are determined they will continue to mean nothing and be looked upon as a joke by everyone except Tony Phyrillas.

    Tony P. lives by the rankings, but think about it: when a blog automatically refreshes itself every few seconds and is often ranked high despite all the faults of the blog itself, both legal and ethical, it's hard not to suggest that the rankings are either fixed and/or easily influenced.

    I like how BNN does link to all the blogs in Pennsylvania, if the authors submit them, but that's all I appreciate about the site. Don't ever expect to see my blog in the Top 20 - I'd prefer if it wasn't.

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  3. Mrs. Dottie,

    There really is no big deal about those ratings. There are many wonderful blogs, both indie and mainstream, that are not listed. It feels good to wake up one morining and learn your blog is highly rated, but it does not really mean too much. I do carry my BNN ranking, but keep it somewhat subdued.

    AJ has, indeed, challenged those ratings. I do think that self-loading blogs or blogs that plagiarize or that try to game the rankings in some way, should be disqualified.

    I do like Blognet itself and like the BNN bulletin feature. I might contact Mastio, the owner, about some sort of code of ethics that blogs could agree to abide by to be considered for ranking.

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  4. Ratings are important. But more importantly, blogs are part of the political conversation.

    How many people discuss politics over beers at the local pub? How many over coffees or around the water cooler at work?

    It is all an important part of the process.

    And open, free, conversations are a necessity for a free people who are engaged in the process of self government.

    If you influence four other people, that is significant.

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  5. Why in our culture must we attempt to influence people? What drives us to do that? It's quite annoying. How about we just let people believe what they want?

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  6. "How about we just let people believe what they want?"


    Now you're just bein' silly!

    ReplyDelete
  7. Joe,

    I agree that open free conversations are important, but why should someone's subjective opinion of my blog (really terrible) be of any importance? I think readers should decide what is important to them.

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  8. Cordi, why is that silly, letting people believe what they want? That is the essence of our democratic process for God's sake! You don't want people to believe what they feel? That's what I'm talking about. The core of our democratic philosophy.

    ReplyDelete
  9. I can believe that the sky is green. I would be wrong.

    We "influence" people by discussing issues and providing facts. That is how we all improve ourselves be it in politics, business, our personal lives, etc.

    Or do you advocate that we all live in our little plastic bubbles with our preconceived or erroneous notions and not seek knowledge and information from others?

    How sad.

    ReplyDelete

You own views are appreciated, especially if they differ from mine. But remember, commenting is a privilege, not a right. I will delete personal attacks or off-topic remarks at my discretion. Comments that play into the tribalism that has consumed this nation will be declined. So will comments alleging voter fraud unless backed up by concrete evidence. If you attack someone personally, I expect you to identify yourself. I will delete criticisms of my comment policy, vulgarities, cut-and-paste jobs from other sources and any suggestion of violence towards anyone. I will also delete sweeping generalizations about mainstream parties or ideologies, i.e. identity politics. My decisions on these matters are made on a case by case basis, and may be affected by my mood that day, my access to the blog at the time the comment was made or other information that isn’t readily apparent.