Monday, June 25, 2012

On The Interwebs, Nobody Can Hear You Scream...

No worries all, I will still be posting the latest Letters from Rehab later this evening but first there's something I wanted to share with you. Now that I'm back in the blogging mood, and I will be updating rather frequently as I find it very therapeutic, I was looking through all the new options that Blogspot has to offer. Something that always bothered me in the past is that I had no idea how many views I was getting and if anybody was really listening outside of the few comments on the blog itself and responses to the link on Facebook and Twitter.

Turns out, a lot more people were listening than I thought.

Blogspot added a counter that tallies all the views not only the site gets, but each individual post. Now before I had just added the "Cluster Map" function (which you can see on the right hand side of the blog) that shows where around the world people are "tuning in" to hear me ramble. Which by the way, was a real eye opener when I first saw that map. If you haven't seen it, check it out for yourself. If this was a game of Risk, I would be dominating.

Now where were we, ah yes, the new Page Views. I took it upon myself to scroll through old blog "data" and my jaw literally dropped at some of the numbers. Now remember, most of the old entries were courtesy of our old friend "Drunk Sean" and I'm glad he didn't have access to these numbers because I fear for what the world would have to hear from him. Not that it would have been anything really terrible, but I'm sure people would have had better things to read about then why "Haruhi Suzumiya is the greatest anime character" or how "Empire Strikes Back is clearly the best movie known to man" (The latter mainly because it's true and everyone is aware of this.)


So looking over the charts I see that the number one ranked blog I have written clocked in at just under 2,000 page views. It was about the Voice Actor Dee Bradley Baker, you can read it HERE, and his awesomeness on The Clone Wars series. Reading it now it's clear I'm just having fun and never really expected it to be seen by that many people, let alone 2,000. Had I been aware of this I probably would have found a more appropriate opening than "I have lost a total of 12 lbs in the month of April. Who wants to touch me?"


I can only assume those numbers exist because I took it upon myself to tag Dee Bradley Baker in the post on Twitter and he retweeted it. That's the only logical explanation I can think of. Which is an honor, truly, but dear lord I wish it had been a post actually worthy of a retweet. He probably thought it was praise from a wide-eyed, enthusiastic 14 year old. (Which, during my drinking days, I basically was. In mind not body).

But let's flash forward now shall we? Almost two years on the dot. With alcohol out of my life, and in a clear state of mind, I am now able to continue writing and sharing about the things that I love. Besides the blog, one of my favorite gigs is always writing pieces for my friend's website Fanboy Comics. They have given me more opportunities than I could possibly imagine (and I can imagine quite a bit) but I believe the happiest moment in my sober life was the chance to interview my voice acting hero, Mr. James Arnold Taylor.

And that is no exaggeration. I was beside myself. What I had thought was going to be a simple interview via the magic of email turned into a 13 minute audio response from the man himself. The girlfriend still makes fun of me for my initial reaction to listening to it for the first time. She said she had to check for vital signs and make sure I was still breathing.

But none of that would have been possible without the help of James' publicist, Consetta, who I have personally dubbed "The Sweetest Woman on the Planet." That's not even a joke you guys, she is literally the nicest women ever. We talk almost daily now on Twitter, so she's already aware of all this, but like I stated in my Kevin Smith/Jason Mewes blog, some people really don't know the effect they can have on someones life until they just come out and say it. It sounds cheesy but honestly, saying one nice thing to someone could completely change their day.

That's why I like to take the time out on the blog to do just that. Thank those who have helped me and inspired me to be a better person, whether they are aware of it or not.




2 comments:

bluedrakon said...

I like that feature as well for the page/post views. I sometimes thing no one is reading my blog and then you see numbers.

Even though they may not leave a note/comment, doesn't mean they are there :D

Seantaku said...

Exactly. Just some form of clarification so I know I'm not talking to myself. Heh