Eighteen is the Present Depend

Right here we’re once more for the eighteenth time to mark the beginning of this insanity.  Who knew it will develop into… no matter it’s now.  What is that this web site now?  I imply, it’s nonetheless largely about video video games normally and MMORPGs specifically.  However in spite of everything this time it’s also one thing of a time capsule of a sliver of the style.

If you ship an AI out to do a human’s job, you get what you get

It’s also a bit of non-public historical past.  That is about all anyone goes to get of an autobiography out of me, the occasional facet tales I write up for weekend posts.

And even these anniversary posts have developed over time.  As I all the time say, take a look at all of the work I put into a few of these early posts.  That they had themes!  Now… properly, return and take a look at a few of the outdated ones if you would like fancy.  Right here they’re:

I’ll say this right here after which most likely repeat myself a couple of instances, however I’m feeling like 20 years is absolutely the subsequent massive second for these posts, so I could be mailing it on this 12 months and most definitely subsequent 12 months.

The Fundamental Stats

Again to this, although as tends to be the case over time, WP.com has damaged or eliminated some stats from view once more, in addition to altering a little bit of terminology right here and there.  Nonetheless, here’s what I’ve received.  Additionally, within the curiosity of having the ability to write this upfront, all stats going ahead can be from September 1st.  I’m truly on an airplane as this goes dwell… at the least I hope I’m.

Days since launch: 6,564 (+354, as a result of Sep 1 calculation)
Posts complete: 7,172 (+376)
Complete Phrases: 5,693,521 (+430,339 phrases, not together with this publish)***
Common phrases per publish: 837 (+17)
Submit Likes: 20,961 (+2,717)
Common posts per day: 1.092 (-0.002… I’m slowing… slowly)
Feedback: 38,979 (+1,033)
Common feedback per publish: 5.51 (-0.17)
Common feedback per day: 6.02 (-0.21)
Spam feedback: lowering, as a result of WP.com solely counts again 12 years
Feedback written by me: 7,938 or 21.1%
Photographs uploaded: WP.com now not provides me a rely, however most likely north of 21K
House utilized by pictures: 3.9 GB used, 9.1 GB (70.2%) add area remaining.
Weblog Subscribers: 2,548 (+132)
US Presidents since launch: 4
British Monarchs since launch: 2
Prime Ministers of Italy since launch: 9

As I famous beforehand, if I had opted for Prime Ministers of the UK I’d have been as much as 8 by now due to Tory incompetence, epitomized by Brexit.  However again in 2006 the UK appears secure and Prime ministers served for 3-6 years.

Having crossed the 6.2 million phrase mark I’m past the Wheel of Time sequence, which rings in a bit previous 4.3 million phrases, and have entered the realm of The Malazan Guide of the Fallen sequence by Steven Erikson in uncooked verbosity. (I additionally like that after a guide sequence goes past a sure size, the entries on Wikipedia acquire a bit on simply the uncooked output.)

Not that I’m making any type of qualitative comparisons, and even evaluating a degree of effort.  All the pieces I write is a primary draft that wants work and even a couple of reasonably disciplined chimps might have matched my very uncooked output.  I’m simply stating that you would be able to, in actual fact, stack shit that prime.

There’s most likely the body of a novel in there someplace.  With some effort I might maybe scrape collectively 80-100K phrases that resembled a novel; doubtless a story of a New Eden capsuleer. However I’m not going to dig that out, polish it up, and attempt to body it.

Information Unfiltered

So what’s going on right here on the weblog?  Individuals nonetheless come to go to.  Not as many as used to, however many greater than I figured ever would.  So let’s see what the numbers are, beginning with web page views.

Yr 18 – Web page views by month

I favor the outdated WP.com chart that had full numbers slightly than rounding up.  You may nonetheless mouse over that chart within the dashboard and get the precise numbers, however I’m not so as to transcribe all of these.  However one other part of the dashboard tells me all of it provides as much as 6,484,423 web page views over the lifetime of the weblog, which is about 987 web page views per publish.

If solely a web page view had some worth you could possibly promote.  I’d have greater than 6 million of one thing!

However, after all, all these web page views should not evenly distributed, so we’ve got the typical web page views monthly.

Yr 18 – Common Every day Views by Month

As I all the time notice, the height of the weblog was someplace round 2012 or 2013, which corresponds with the height of some different issues.  I did a chart for a Blaugust publish about running a blog that provides one other view of this.

Web page view for TAGN by 12 months

Running a blog isn’t useless, however it’s nowhere close to as in style.  It has additionally extra “blog-like” choices, issues like Substack and what not which can be, for all intents and functions simply blogs, even when the authors of them faux they’re one thing new, completely different, of particular.

I additionally began sticking some Google Search Console knowledge on this part for the final couple of years.  However, once more, I simply wrote an entire weblog publish about that for Blaugust, so there is no such thing as a have to repeat that every one once more.  Go right here for that knowledge.

After which there may be yet another chart I typical toss in right here.  I normally simply paste in a picture of it, however this 12 months I’m going to aim to make it textual content from Excel.

I’m a bit stunned that the typical phrases per publish isn’t as much as 1,000 but.  However I did spend the primary third of the weblog’s life, six years, cranking out posts within the 500 phrase vary.

I’ll have to return and look to see what modified my model in 2012 and 2013… there are these years once more… the place I instantly about doubled my phrase rely per publish.

I’ve a powerful suspicion it was due to EVE On-line.  In December 2011 I moved to null sec and commenced my narrative about my adventures there, one thing that lends itself to an extended model.

EVE On-line isn’t like WoW the place each dungeon we do as a gaggle has been performed by tons of of hundreds, if not hundreds of thousands, of different individuals so there is no such thing as a want to elucidate a variety of the context.  In null sec in EVE On-line there’s a lengthy, ongoing story that possibly 100K individuals world-wide know some piece of, and possibly 5-10K are totally immersed in.

Anyway, that’s an exploration for one more day.

Extra Frivolous Information

I’m going to do some bit of labor right here, however largely as a result of I can copy and paste the format from final 12 months’s publish and replace a couple of numbers.  Additionally I copied and pasted that sentence, and some others, from final 12 months’s publish.  I’ve an excessive amount of happening, I’ve to get this performed.

We’ll begin with the highest ten classes of posts right here, and the change since final 12 months.  Out of 104 complete classes, these are, had been, and stay, essentially the most used.

1. EVE On-line – 2,285 (+100)
2. World of Warcraft – 1,731 (+99)
3. EverQuest II – 803 (+13)
4. EverQuest – 695 (+44)
5. Blizzard – 573 (+41)
6. Lord of the Rings On-line – 488 (+7)
7. Occasion Group – 452 (+19)
8. WoW Basic – 448 (+85)
9. CCP – 422 (+40)
10. Sony On-line Leisure – 345 (+0)

I discover is suspicious that I wrote precisely 100 publish about EVE On-line for the reason that seventeenth anniversary publish.  However spherical numbers do this to accountants.

World of Warcraft will get buoyed up as a result of I double class each WoW Basic publish as additionally a part of the World of Warcraft class.  So, actually, it seems to be like I wrote 14 posts about WoW that weren’t about WoW Basic.

Sony On-line Leisure, which hasn’t been a factor since 2015, carries on by way of inertia and the truth that not a variety of different classes get as a lot use.  eleventh place is YouTube, a class I slap on any publish that I embed a video in, and it is just a 267.  So except I go shopping with movies, that listing will most likely be the identical subsequent 12 months.

Tags, alternatively, symbolize the land of chaos.  Tags I slap on a publish at a whim, as a joke, as a futile try and sign tone or intention.  And typically I exploit tags for video games I’m not certain fairly deserve a class but.  No Man’s Sky is just a tag thus far.  So there are 4,778 tags on the listing.

For tags I really feel like I’ve to do a high 20 simply to get some scope.

1. Delve – 134
2. World Struggle Bee – 129
3. Development Server – 125
4. Asher Elias – 117
5. Meaningless Milestones – 113
6. Reavers – 99
7. EVE Month-to-month Financial Report – 99
8. MMO Expansions – 92
9. Wrath of the Lich King – 91
10. Fippy Darkpaw – 85
11. Nostalgia – 82
12. Imperium – 82
13. EVE Updates – 81
14. Council of Stellar Administration – 77
15. Cataclysm – 74
16. Rambling Detected – 70
17. Warlords of Draenor – 66
18. Free-To-Play – 64
19. BlizzCon – 60
20. Talent Factors – 59

As soon as once more, you may see how EVE On-line drives my conduct.  There’s a variety of nuance in there, and I really feel like I’ve to drop tags for individuals, locations, corps, alliances, coalitions, and issues round facets of the sport and updates.

There’s additionally some fascinating recurring tags.  Meaningless Milestones has turn into my default anniversary tag, together with for this publish.  In order that quantity is already up by one.  And there are some WoW expansions in there.  However it’s largely EVE On-line.

Then, only for kicks, listed here are the tags I’ve used precisely 18 instances.

1. SUWT – 18
2. MMO Nostalgia – 18
3. Blizzard Authenticator – 18
4. Raptr – 18
5. Pet Battles – 18
6. Venal – 18
7. DBRB – 18
8. Tribute – 18
9. 2020 – 18

I needed to click on on SUWT to see what that was.  It was a podcast I used to seem on often.  Been a very long time since I’ve been on a type of.  There are a pair different odd ones.  Is MMO Nostalgia completely different than simply Nostalgia?  You inform me.

After which the anticipated EVE On-line entries.  Venal and Tribute are areas in New Eden and DBRB is/was a famed Imperium fleet commander.

What Do Individuals Learn Right here?

I write a variety of issues.  As famous above, we’re properly previous the 7K mark for posts.  Most of them are despatched forth into the ether and by no means heard from once more.  However a choose few acquire traction with Google or social media, or some sub-group on the market and really get a little bit of visitors.  What had been these in 2018?  Listed below are the highest 20.

1. Timing these Fortunate Eggs for Friendship Milestones in Pokemon Go – 13,572
2. Collapse within the North: B2 Joins the Imperium after 18 Months Below Assault – 4,202
3. Sixty Years In the past At present – 3,952
4. Answering Gaming Questions with AI – Discovering a Heat Ocean in Minecraft – 3,810
5. A Yr of Elon Musk Wrecking Twitter – 3,333
6. Tarisland – I Hate it Already – 3,253
7. Alamo teechs u 2 play DURID! – 2,848
8. Degree 45 at Final in Pokemon Go – 2,824
9. Pokemon Go Now Lets You Use a Fortunate Egg at Friendship Milestones – 2,405
10. Beginning No Man’s Sky – My Ship is on Fireplace and I’m Being Irradiated – 2,310
11. A Temporary Timeline of the Imperium – 2,305
12. EVE On-line – The Null Sec Alliance Affect Map 2007-2022 – 2,123
13. Usenet Newsgroups Half I – I discover some Usenet Archives on CD-ROM – 2,077
14. Blackrock Caverns for 4 – 2,038
15. Only a Lockpicking Minute… – 1,966
16. Moving into the EverQuest 2024 Roadmap – 1,945
17. The Lord of the Rings On-line 2024 Roadmap – 1,900
18. The Plan for the Return of H1Z1 – 1,893
19. My Steam Replay for 2023… Plus My XBox 2023 Stats – 1,869
20. From the Village to the Island – 1,851

As I famous, higher to write down about Pokemon Go than EVE On-line.

There are a couple of golden oldies in there, and even a couple of current posts.  However nearly all of it’s unintentional visitors and in no way something I deliberate.

Then, simply to get again to an outdated listing, listed here are the highest 20 most considered posts right here of all time.

1. Play On: Guild Identify Generator – 66,090
2. Alamo teechs u 2 play DURID! – 59,363
3. Operating Civilization II on Home windows 7 64-bit – 56,791
4. How To Discover An Agent in EVE On-line – 40,261
5. How one can Catch Zorua and Zoroark – 36,255
6. First Pokemon Black and White Obtain Occasion – Victini – 33,304
7. Minecraft and the Seek for a Heat Ocean – 29,221
8. From Alola Pokedex to Nationwide Pokedex in Pokemon Solar – 25,951
9. April Fools at Blizzard – 2013 – 24,733
10. Contemplating Star Wars Galaxies Emulation? Higher Seize a Disk! – 24,636
11. Getting Higher Blackrock Spire Entry – 23,570
12. Diablo III vs. Torchlight II – A Matter of Particulars – 22,231
13. 20 Video games that Outlined the Apple II – 19,446
14. The Mighty Insta-90 Query – Which Class to Enhance? – 18,697
15. EVE On-line – The Tutorial – 18,696
16. Timing these Fortunate Eggs for Friendship Milestones in Pokemon Go – 16,657
17. World of Warcraft Journal – Concern 2 – 15,967
18. Sort 59 Being Pulled from the World of Tanks Retailer – 15,931
19. Degree 85 in EverQuest… Now What? – 15,831
20. How I Obtained My 5,000 Turbine Factors – 15,057

Really feel the inertia of some actually outdated posts that received a variety of views again when the weblog was younger.  A few oldies from the primary listing made it right here, however nothing I write as of late will doubtless ever make the reduce.

You’ll discover a sample although, that a variety of these posts are “the right way to” guides which have titles that match up with doubtless Google searches.  There’s most likely a lesson in that, however I’m now so set in my running a blog ways in which it appears unlikely that I’ll see it, a lot much less act upon it.

The Inevitable Summing Up

Final 12 months I stated possibly I’ll have this found out this 12 months.  And now right here we’re and I’m able to kick the can down the highway to 12 months 19.

Really, I’m contemplating pulling a CCP and simply ignoring the nineteenth 12 months with a purpose to prep for the twentieth anniversary, ought to I make it that far.  What ought to I do for 20 years?  Effectively, for starters, each month in evaluation publish may have a “Twenty Years In the past” part by default.  That may all make us really feel outdated.

I’ve thought-about getting in and doing month in evaluation posts out for the subsequent decade or two, in case I get sick of this or fall over useless… this being an more and more doubtless state of affairs as we go ahead… simply to bother all people.  However what are the probabilities that WordPress.com will nonetheless be round in that time-frame?  What are the percentages the online can be one thing recognizable by then?  And if you wish to get actually grim, what likelihood is there that we’ll haven’t wrecked the planet sufficient with our air pollution and AI knowledge farms that we’ll be past something in addition to day by day survival?

Effectively, that was a bummer.  I get a bit unhappy after I understand I gained’t be round to see issues on the Timeline of the Far Future after which understand I would nonetheless dwell lengthy sufficient to see the autumn of civilization.

I’m not all the time that cheerful.

In any other case, all indicators point out that there can be a weblog publish tomorrow and issues right here will keep on as typical.  It is going to be a few sport you most likely by no means performed.  I’ll hand that a lot out.

Thanks for studying.  Strap in for one more 12 months of this nonsense.