Constant Comments

With my Inner Curmudgeon missing, I’m afraid I may have turned a bit whiny about comments here on Bud’s Blog.   In a comment to thesinglecell, I lamented that our posts on Amy Winehouse received only one comment each and then, in Missing Curmudgeon I actually wrote, I went back and reread my post, Creativity and Amy Winehouse … possibly the best post I’ve written in a fortnight … noting that I’d only gotten one comment … then complained about the one comment I did receive.  Yikes!  I need my curmudgeon back!

Anyway, as I posted on Tuesday, a message from WordPress popped up and congratulated me on my 565th post, referring me to the WordPress post, Getting More Views and Traffic.  Don’t get me started on views.   I was a regular view-counter until I discovered how many views were generated by bots, little computer programs that visit websites and blogs to promote who knows what.  Besides, I’ve done almost everything on WordPress’ list of suggestion except pay for visitors.  Yes, I know we all write for ourselves because it’s what we do … but we all like to be read and the two best indicators of being read are comments and subscriptions.   So, this week’s whining not withstanding, I appreciate my subscribers and regular commenters, who I’ll get to in a moment, after I mention my favorite geeky engineer blogging principle, the 90-9-1 Rule, which says 1% of those online will create internet content, 9% may edit or modify content, and 90% will view the content without contributing, that is, be lurkers.  So, if you believe this rule, the number of people reading your blog should be roughly ten times the number of comments you receive.

So, I’ve received 2,879 comments since Bud’s Blog was born … a fairly significant percentage of which are my own, since I try to respond to comments (except when I’m on vacation).  Interestingly, that’s almost exactly 1/10 of the total number of views.  Hmm … 90-9-1.  My first comment was from my friend Barry, way back when I posted Soul Music in 2009.   My most treasured comment was my second  from my sister-in-law, Sandy … I love thy blog…ye old Renaissance man!  Brought a few laughs, tears and lots of thoughts to mind. Love, S.  Sandy always seemed to get my need to write.  My brother-in-law, Norm is my favorite lurker by the way … although he doesn’t comment, he occasional sends me an emoticon by email in response to a post, usually a 🙂 or a 😕 .  Terri of These Are Days (formerly Into the Mystic formerly Terri Terri Quite Contrary) and been on board almost from the beginning and has been my most consistent commenter, followed closely by Meleah of Mea Culpa Momma Mia.   Most of my commenters are women (even my one canine commenter, Sandy, is a female Golden Retriever) … I don’t know whether that’s a reflection of the blogosphere as a whole or a reflection on what I write, but I appreciate my male commenters, Bob S. (who swears he’s going to start a blog someday), Oscar of Conditionally Satisfactory and Rick of In My Own Write.  The most curmudgeonly comment I’ve received comes from my brother, Glenn, on Dumb Guy Chic and Jeni of Down River Drivel owns the longest.   The shortest was from thesinglecell … Awww 🙂 … which is totally out of character, since she usually leaves thought-provoking comments.  The crowd at BlogDumps has turned up like clockwork for Top Sites Tuesday.   I appreciate all comments received, in spite of my recent whining.  I also appreciate the 41 souls who are subscribers to Older Eyes – Bud’s Blog.

I’m noticing that this is starting to sound like an Awards speech or a farewell post.  Nope.  It’s just Writing Wednesday and I’m feeling grateful for readers.

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Tags: blogging, comments, curmudgeonly rants, favorites, gratitude, postaday2011, writing and blogging

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