Though I tend not to really pay much attention to the hit rates on my blog, I occasionally pop by Google Analytics just to see what people have been looking at and what’s brought them to my site.
This is something I particularly do on days like today, when I am stuck at home. I lost my voice on Monday and took today off to let the medicines I was prescribed kick in and make everything all better. Looks like I’ll be back to work tomorrow, but my throat is still a little blah at the moment. (I expect it’ll be fine soon, though; the doc who saw it said it was just a common cold, but he also exclaimed in shock at the inflammation in my tonsils and throat. It felt like my tonsils had grown to twice their normal length and were scraped with sandpaper, actually. But the shot I got, and the pills I’m taking, seem to be helping in managing the inflammation and pain.)
Anyway, after looking at my hit rates and so on, I think it’s worth noting that anyone who’d like a very popular blog could do worse than to start one dedicated to bashing two major anti-rationalist/anti-science figures in America today: Deepak Chopra and Derrick Jensen.
The record of which keyword searches have brought people to my site include large numbers of variations of phrases like “Deepak Chopra full of shit” and “Derrick Jensen criticism.”
In fact, one of my most popular posts ever has been my response to a particularly self-righteous and histrionic interview Jensen did with a magazine called the Ecologist. That post still gets a slow but steady stream of commenters; some of them are people who’re happy to see Jensen slammed for reasons that they themselves experienced either as past followers, or as people connected to past followers, while others seem to be angry devotees eager to “defend” Jensen from criticism. There were even a few thoughtful and interesting (if somewhat misguided, in my opinion) comments from people who are sympathetic to Jensen, as well.
I should Google you occasionally just to boost your hit count on some of these posts.
I subscribed to your RSS feed some time ago, so I get all of your articles with my daily email (and the inbox is all the richer for it!), but I may not be showing up in the analytics as much as I should .. ;)
No worries, Bruce. As I said, I’m not particularly concerned about the analytics, and anyway, I have a plugin that tracks how many people are subscribed to the RSS reader too… :)