city at night

city at night

Monday, May 11, 2015

50,000 and Counting

Sometime during the night the counter on my blog hit the 50,000 mark.  That may seem impressive since I have only had my blog for about a year and a half.  However, that number is of page visits not of individual visitors.  So if someone looks at several pages during a visit, that increases the number.

Also a sizeable percentage of that number are not from legitimate visitors.  In the first months of writing, when I would look at my statistics, the leading traffic sources were two websites... "vampirestat" and "7secretsearch".  They advertise themselves as "domain and site appraisal" services.  I did a bit of research, and one blogger who writes about tech issues said...

" just ignore all of that, as it is the product of worthless scumbag referrer spam-bots. Automated, unattended software programs generate these supposed "hits" on your site. They do not represent any human visitors and are not of any interest whatsoever. Do not visit the referring sites, because there is a high probability of malware."   (Tech lore by Igor)

I had over 5000 hits from those two sites.  I am also suspicious of the fact that I have had over 2100 views from Malaysia, over 1200 from Ukraine, and nearly 600 from Russia.  That seems a bit fishy to me.

I am also puzzled by the statistics on the most viewed posts.  Last February I wrote a post about the Mexican artist, José María Velasco.  That entry has been viewed 1309 times, and each day the number increases.  I did a "google search" of José María Velasco, and my blog post does not show up anywhere in the first several pages.  So where are these constant hits coming from??? 

Of course I have had many genuine, human visitors!  Some time ago I added a  "live traffic feed" gadget on the side of my blog.  It shows the cities of my visitors.  I know when some of my friends are reading my blog by the cities which are listed.  If I click on the "traffic feed" I can also see from where the visitors arrived.  Whenever I see one of the other blogs with which I am linked (such as "Babsblog" or "Marcoyucatan"), I am confident that those are legitimate visitors.  There are also a number of people who arrive directly.  I assume that they have liked my blog enough to bookmark it on their computer, and they come back to see what I have written.  There are some who visit on a daily basis... like the people from Albion, Pennsylvania or Norwich, England.  I would love for them to write a comment and say "hello", but I am pleased that they find my blog interesting enough to check daily. 

Well, even though that 50,000 number looks nice, it is actually a meaningless statistic.  But I truly appreciate the visits from living, breathing human beings out there!  ¡Muchas gracias!   

8 comments:

  1. Hi, I am your visitor from Norwich, England! I found your site when performing one of my regular searches for Mexico City blogs (I am a big fan of the city and love reading about it, especially from a street level viewpoint). I really enjoy your posts about the city and the country in general, keep up the good work!. Ben

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    1. Hi Ben!
      I am so glad that you enjoy my blog, and it's a pleasure to connect a name with the city of Norwich which appears so regularly on the "traffic feed". How often have you been to Mexico City? I agree... in spite of its faults, it is a fascinating city! Thanks for taking the time to comment, and please feel free to add your thoughts in the future!
      Cheers!

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    2. I have been 4 or 5 times, only for a few days at a time, but I just loved it from day 1. I love the way there is so much art and culture everywhere, the amazing food, the people, and the way that even though it is such a big city it is so manageable with its many neighbourhoods and metro system. I am fascinated by the connection with the past going back to the Aztecs and the colonials and how the old city of Tenochtitlan lies directly beneath the city. So many things really I could go on for ages! I hope to spend a longer period of time there one day soon to really get beneath it's surface. Thanks for your interest in my interest!

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    3. As you know from reading my blog, I usually go down to Mexico City three times a year to visit my friend. It's amazing that every trip I manage to see something that I have not seen before.

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  2. Well, what a lovely set of comments. I enjoy your blog, though as you've no doubt noticed, I tend to read a bunch of posts "in bulk," rather than visiting regularly. Also, lately I've somewhat unplugged myself from the matrix, instead doing more in the real world like working on my garden or reading actual books.

    As for blog stats, on Wordpress, there's some info about what search results led people to the blog. Some are quite weird. And of course the spam comments are also quite weird. I even wrote a post about them.

    Saludos,

    Kim G
    Boston, MA
    Where one of these days we should write another post.

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    1. On Blogger I also can see the search results, and, yes, some of them are quite strange. When I go to "Google" and type in the same words, I don't find my blog listed. I don't know how they end up at my blog.

      I've been doing a lot of gardening too, but when I'm done, all I feel like doing is plopping myself in front of the computer.

      Yes, it's time for you to write another post... the winter snows are old news. LOL.
      Saludos,
      Bill

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