As I enter my fifth year of blogging, I find myself 360° from where I began. In the beginning, I was writing for a few members of my family and a few friends. That was my audience and the stats proved it. I remember when I first saw the number of unique visitors creep into double digits and I recall being surprised when there were returning visitors who weren't friends or family. In the beginning, I didn't care how many people were reading, I was just having a blast writing.
At some point a couple of years ago, I saw the number of daily visitors hit triple digits and I slightly modified my focus. Heading into 2006 I decided to blog less about the completely Mike Boon-centric aspects of my life and more about subjects that would appeal to the average Torontonian or displaced Torontonian. I started focusing on the traffic, I moved to Movable Type, opened all entries up to comments and even added ads to the interior.
In 2006 I saw the number of daily visitors hit quadruple digits but I realized the content of my blog would never have mass appeal. If I wanted more eyeballs and if I actually wanted to make any money from this, I'd have to dramatically modify my entire approach to this blog. It would become less interesting for my family and friends but more interesting to the thousands of new visitors who hit this site after Googling. I'd have to sacrifice the current organic state of my writing for a more manipulative, skewed approach designed to increase returning visitors. I'd also have to add sponsored links to the home page.
Here we are in 2007 and I find myself right back where I started. I'm going to write about what I want to write about, regardless of whether there are 20 people reading or 20,000 people reading. I'll always be naturally curious as to how people get to this site, but I'm not going to care about how many unique visitors there are or how many returning visitors there are. It just doesn't matter.
From now on, it's all about me. This is a hobby, a public display of a passion for writing. It's Mike Boon-centric and you can either visit or not. I'm a regular guy who loves his family, his city, his hockey team, his music and his Simpsons. When something interests me, I'll write about it. Everyone is welcome to follow along, but when I write I'm writing for a few members of my family and a few friends.
It's just like it was in the beginning.
