A few blog highlights from 2007:
• The number of visitors increased 20-fold in the past 12 months (and no, we didn’t start with a single-digit base). That’s pretty impressive, given that we stumbled in the dark for so much of the year.
• The most-read posts were the obvious ones: the mayoral elections, the Trinity referendum, and the Lake Highlands Town Center. Several school-related posts were in the top 10, including a discussion about possible school closings in the RISD, a muffin prank update, and Nancy Chapel’s accident. Also in the top 10 were Sarah Miller of Lake Highlands becoming a Rhodes Scholar, the Lake Highlands home tour, and the closing of the original Chili’s.
• Yes, that’s only nine, but that’s because the 10th deserves a paragraph of its own. J.J. Pair has chronicled her adventures with the area’s law enforcement community here and here and here, and she seems to have hit on something — even when blog visitors didn’t agree with her.
• We have had visitors from Pakistan, India, Finland, France and Great Britain. Reading about J.J.’s ticket woes, perhaps? We have also had visitors from the U.S. military and the state and federal governments.
• My favorite visitors? The people from Brinker, who checked out the item about the company’s first store closing. Hopefully, they learned a thing or two, though I wouldn’t bet on it. In addition, 2 percent of our traffic was generated by visitors from belo.com, the sixth highest total for a domain name and just below aol.com. I will let you draw your own conclusions (as well as make your own witticisms) about that.
Thanks for stopping by. Most of the changes we have promised — and that you have asked for — should be in place by the end of February. (The Advocate web site will be new and improved as well.) That means the the blog will be more fun to read, more fun to visit, and even more in tune with what’s going on around here. That is, after all, the Advocate’s reason for being.
