Blog Stats
Back in November and December, when I published all those Thanksgiving and Christmas recipes, magic happened. All of a sudden, the blog was getting 500 – 600+ hits a day. I watched in amazement. The two top posts were Mom’s Fruitcake Recipe and Divinity Candy. The Divinity recipe still gets about 3 hits a day. Go figure. I only started collecting recipes when I discovered I wasn’t a great cook, and needed some fail-safe recipes to protect myself. Life is funny that way.
The rational side of my brain knew it was temporary, sort of like being a rock-star; you know it is an aberration, you know it can’t last forever, and you can’t help but love it. I was addicted. I would look at those blog stats in sheer wonder.
It all came to a screeching halt the day after Christmas. Oh, yeh, a few loyal fans kept the stats up until New Year’s, but the drop after Christmas was dramatic – like 300 people a day. Running the recipes did attract a good number of regular readers who continue reading, but nothing like before Christmas.
WordPress has these great charts for displaying blog hits, feeds, readers, even daily hits on individual articles. Until January 25th, I am stuck with a statistics chart that shows a huge readership to the left, and a dribble to the right. I am eager to have the chart entirely normal once again so I can keep things in perspective.
We all have our own reasons for blogging. One of mine is to put down in writing some records of things I see, think about, hear, my reactions to events. I don’t want to care about statistics, they are irrelevant, maybe even detrimental to my purpose. . . .but I do.
How about you? do you check your statistics? Do you follow who is reading your blog? Where readership is coming from? Is this a good or bad thing? Does it interfere with your purpose in blogging?
Blogging: The Opinion Explosion
Today there was a lively discussion on National Public Radio about news, and the great enormity of it, and how news reporting is changing. It used to be, so they said, that news reporters reported the facts, as best they could find the information, and they kept their opinions to themselves. The goal was objectivity.
Hmmmmm. In the US, it seems to me we had an entire period when the press was seen as “muckracking” or seeking scandal. The tabloids have always been with us. Even in the HBO TV series Rome, there were cartoons on the wall, a sort of primitive newspaper, entertaining, whether true or not-true.
So my speculation would be that as objective and fair (or as Fox puts it “fair and balanced” reporting which totally makes me want to throw up because FOX is SO SO slanted) as we would like to think our news is, bias has always crept in, and it is always a case of caveat emptor when it comes to news.
Here were some priceless quotes and ideas from the today’s NPR discussion:
“Not everyone’s experience is that interesting.”
Two rules for basic research:
1) Not every authority is right. Don’t believe someone just because they claim “authority”. Authorities can be wrong.
2) Just because you agree with an authoritie’s opinion does not make it true.
When you blog, podcast, SMS, etc. information, be sure to give your source of information and some evaluation of how reliable that source is likely to be.
Wikipedia is not necessarily a reliable source to be quoting. You have to double check the sources of information there, too.
My favorite piece of verbiage: We are experiencing a cacaphony of unfiltered information.
My comment: It’s exciting to hear people discuss the new ways in which we are getting – and sharing – news/information. I was in traffic, trying desperately to write phrases and ideas down at every red light. (How often do you say “alhamdallah” for the red lights??) We have access to so much more information, but how much of it is “hard” and how much is opinion? I love hearing people discussing information and dissemination of information, and how it is changing our lives.
And how much harder it is for any nation to keep a big secret – the containment walls have become more porous, information seeps through. Cell phones transmit real time dramas, bloggers share information (and misinformation), news can be SMS’d before it hits the airwaves by official sources. Governments which like to control information are fighting a losing battle, and it will increasingly change the faces of government (oops, my opinion!).
As our actions become increasingly public (cameras tracking vehicles, bank withdrawals, parking lots, cell phones broadcasting private moments, etc) we will all become, privately and publicly, increasingly accountable. (I am extrapolating here!) What an interesting new world . . .
Holiday Greetings from your Bank
Can anything else go wrong? Fortunately, I have a great sense of humor. But here is my worst nightmare come true.
Money is protection, right? Credit is money where carrying cash could be dangerous or inconvenient. Living overseas, we use our credit cards often, because it is easy to pay it off every month from the bank.
I am a little obsessive, I pay the bill, and then I check to insure that the bill has been paid. I saw my credit card register the recent payment, and then, a couple days later, to my astonishment, I saw the payment disappear. It was “reversed”.
Long story short, the credit card bank refused a BANK CHECK from my bank. The credit card bank said it came back saying “unable to find account” but the bank says the credit card bank failed to endorse it. Everyone agrees this is not my fault but meanwhile – I have a large check that is neither in my bank account nor has it paid off the credit card.
The credit card company says they submitted the check again, with their endorsement (they agree that they didn’t endorse it) and that the bank sent it back again. The bank says that didn’t happen, that the check was only submitted once. I believe some clerk somewhere made one little mistake and created this problem, but meanwhile, it is tying up MY money!
Meanwhile, snow storms hit Denver, and the credit card company has been unable to do any customer service for days, since all the banks, etc. were unmanned – people couldn’t get to their jobs. And now starts the Christmas holiday season when . . . the banks will be closed for at least three days.
And my father dies, and I need to quickly have an airline ticket, car rental, all the usual expenses of travelling.
Fortunately, we have stashes here and there we can draw from, and are not too worried about this. We know it will be resolved eventually, but I am insisting that the two banks work it out and make sure I don’t have to pay any charges on the amount that I PAID with a BANK CHECK. The bank calls daily to keep me up to date – up to date meaning that there is no progress.
Happy Holidays to you, Uncle Scrooge!
Cross Cultural Flummox
Scanning through the blogs yesterday, I saw one I almost didn’t check. It seemed to be a no-brainer. LaialyQ8 asked if you would share your password with your husband/wife.
Sheerly out of idle curiousity, I checked. And I was stunned to see the responses. Almost every person said they WOULD.
I’ve thought about it all day. It has to be a cultural difference. Hands down, I bet most of my friends would say “no way!” It isn’t a question of how much you love someone, to me, I just need some areas of my life that are private. I don’t keep secrets from my husband – I share things with him gladly.
But do I think he needs access to my correspondence with old girlfriends, friends I knew before I knew him? If they confide details of some crisis to me, does he need access to that information?
He trusts me. He should! And he would never, never ask me for my password, and I wouldn’t ask for his. Of course we share passwords for financial records and access, but not for our e-mail accounts.
It never for a heartbeat occurred to me there was another way of thinking about it. I was flummoxed (that’s for you, Zin!) And it is good information; I need to think about this and integrate it and try to understand it. That’s one of the things I love about living in a foreign country; challenges my assumptions and forces me to think differently, outside the box.
Today’s Grin: We are Forbidden to Report the Following Story
Todays Kuwait Times bottom left corner:
Information Gags Press
Kuwait: The Ministry of Information issued a gag order to all local media over reporting the tussle between two leading Kuwait companies over the September takeover of a KSE-listed firm. A copy of the court order ordering the ban was attatched to the ministry’s letter to all local dailies and media. The following is a translation of the accompanying Arabic letter (shown on the front page):
From the Ministry of Information, To the Editor-in-Chief, Kuwait Times. With reference to case number 900/2006 filed by Mohammed Abdul Mohsen Al-Kharafi Holding Co and Mohammed Abdul Mohsen Al-Khorafi & Sons for General Trading and Contracting against the Minister of Commerce and Industry as the supreme chairman of the Kuwait Stock Exchange (KSE), a court order has been issued pertaining to the banning of the publication of any news concerning the subject of the contestation (number 2/2006) till a verdict is issued concerning the nondisclosure violations. Therefore, please be advised to stop any publication till the case is over.
So the Kuwait Times reports that it cannot report the story. Brilliant.
Bahrain Censors Google Earth
This morning my nephew from GE sent me an e-mail with an article from the Financial Times on Mahmoud’s Den and Google Earth in Bahrain. When Google Earth upgraded the resolution on Bahrain, Bahrainis started recording the discrepancy in properties, and circulating copies of residencies, luxury cars, boats, etc. in contrast to the poor, crowded villages. The Bahraini government banned the use of Google Earth in Bahrain. You can guess what happened next – downloads shot through the roof. It’s just human nature.
The article in Financial Times gives more information.
When are governments going to figure out that when you ban a technology, you only make it more attractive? Google Earth downloads for free, it is available to everyone with a computer and adequate bandwidth. No matter what safeguards you put in, there are ways around it. That’s just the nature of technology.
Mahmoud’s Den sports a button that says “No Sunni, No Shiia, Just Bahraini”.
Humor For Word Lovers
Humor for word lovers…
A fellow word lover passed along these selections from the Washington Post:
These are creative and funny…
Once again, The Washington Post has published the winning submissions to its yearly neologism contest, in which readers are asked to supply alternate meanings for common words.
The winners are:
1. Coffee (n.), the person upon whom one coughs.
2. Flabbergasted (adj.), appalled over how much weight you have gained.
3. Abdicate (v.), to give up all hope of ever having a flat stomach.
4. Esplanade (v.), to attempt an explanation while drunk.
5. Willy-nilly (adj.), impotent.
6. Negligent (adj.), describes a condition in which you absentmindedly answer the door in your nightgown.
7. Lymph (v.), to walk with a lisp.
8. Gargoyle (n.), olive-flavored mouthwash.
9. Flatulence (n.) emergency vehicle that picks you up after you are run over by a steamroller.
10. Balderdash (n.), a rapidly receding hairline.
11. Testicle (n.), a humorous question on an exam.
12. Rectitude (n.), the formal, dignified bearing adopted by proctologists.
13. Pokemon (n), a Rastafarian proctologist.
14. Oyster (n.), a person who sprinkles his conversation with Yiddishisms.
15. Frisbeetarianism (n.), (back by popular demand): The belief that, when you die, your Soul flies up onto the roof and gets stuck there.
16. Circumvent (n.), an opening in the front of boxer shorts worn by Jewish men.
The Washington Post’s Style Invitational also asked readers to take any word from the dictionary, alter it by adding, subtracting, or changing one letter, and supply a new definition.
Here are this year’s winners:
1. Bozone (n.): The substance surrounding stupid people that stops bright ideas from penetrating. The bozone layer, unfortunately, shows little sign of breaking down in the near future.
2. Foreploy (v): Any misrepresentation about yourself for the purpose of getting laid.
3. Cashtration (n.): The act of buying a house, which renders the subject financially impotent for an indefinite period.
4. Giraffiti (n): Vandalism spray-painted very, very high.
5. Sarchasm (n): The gulf between the author of sarcastic wit and the person who doesn’t get it.
6. Inoculatte (v): To take coffee intravenously when you are running late.
7. Hipatitis (n): Terminal coolness.
8. Osteopornosis (n): A degenerate disease. (This one got extra credit.)
9. Karmageddon (n): its like, when everybody is sending off all these really bad vibes, right? And then, like, the Earth explodes and it’s like, a serious bummer
10. Decafalon (n.): The grueling event of getting through the day consuming only things that are good for you.
11. Glibido (v): All talk and no action.
12. Dopeler effect (n): The tendency of stupid ideas to seem smarter when they come at you rapidly.
13. Arachnoleptic fit (n.): The frantic dance performed just after you’ve accidentally walked through a spider web.
14. Beelzebug (n.): Satan in the form of a mosquito that gets into your bedroom at three in the morning and cannot be cast out.
15. Caterpallor (n.): The color you turn after finding half a grub in the fruit you’re eating.
And the pick of the literature:
16. Ignoranus (n): A person who’s both stupid and an asshole.
Little Diamond
My neice is blogging! She started just as I did, without telling anyone. When I saw her on Friday, she very casually mentioned it in passing. Woooo Hoooooo! She is beautiful, and articulate, and always full of amazing information, and a lot of fun. Her website is A Diamond in Sunlight.
Fundamentally Green
Yesterday on National Public Radio, they did a segment on evangelical churches going “green”, i.e. environmentally conscious, and the problems it was causing the Republican party, who count on fundamental support.
Many of the churches are focusing on our stewardship of the environment, and setting up all kinds of recycle programs, calling in their “environmental tithe: (10% of your income.)
The problem is, the Democratic party is the party focused on the environment. So with the November elections coming up, NPR was examining how the shift in thinking will influence the voting.
There are other issues on which Democrats and Republicans differ – my guess is that those issues will have more influence on how people vote. But it is interesting that the “green” issue was raised – it could be a growing influence. The baby-boom generation are still a big voting bloc, and things may shift as they near retirement, and focus differently.
National Public Radio
I like BBC, but most of the time I find I don’t like listening twice to the same program. When you get tired of BBC, here is an alternative: National Public Radio.
You can stream National Public Radio through your computer, and listen to All Things Considered, The Beat . . . all kinds of things you never knew existed. National Public Radio was the only local American station to broadcast Ramadan and Eid greetings, and carried a lot of coverage of the season – objective and factual.
One of my favorite shows is “Wait! Wait! Don’t Tell Me!” which is a cafe-style conversation between very witty people discussing the news of the week. They really skewer politicians who have said stupid things, sing funny songs parodying events, and you just can’t help but laugh out loud when you listen.
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