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A blog does not need “analytics”

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Re: A blog does not need “analytics”

#61

Post by cosmic_cheese »

jasode wrote: post #39
chongli wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

any blog author who is trying to increase their reach, like knowing what topics are of most interest to their audience, when to post for bets result, comparing different styles of post etc. Why would I want to read a blog like that? That's hack writing 101. There's a million of those writers shovelling out that drivel on LinkedIn (which sells them all the analytics they need to do it). I want to read blogs by people…

>I want to read blogs by people who are passionate about their topic [...] I didn't downvote but want to try to explain some of the mindset of some of the authors who do care about analytics and how it affects what they work on. The 2 different activities need to be separated: (1) passionate about a _topic_ vs (2) passionate about _writing_about_ a topic. Some people need some validation from a growing audience (i.e.…

> One could then argue, "why does an author need to care about blogging to an empty void?!?". I don't know what to say. I guess it's just humans being humans and some want a little social proof that whatever they put a lot of time into is useful to more people than a tiny niche audience.

In my case, there’s a social proof element, but it’s also nice to know if I’m basically talking to myself or if there’s somebody out there listening. If it’s the former I feel kind of silly, like someone sitting in an empty room muttering to themselves might, plus writing takes time and energy that I could be putting towards something else. You know how there’s some meals that feel worth cooking if there’s even one other person who’ll be eating, but not if it’s just yourself? It’s like that.

Re: A blog does not need “analytics”

#62

Post by palata »

stevage wrote: post #14
chongli wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

any blog author who is trying to increase their reach, like knowing what topics are of most interest to their audience, when to post for bets result, comparing different styles of post etc. Why would I want to read a blog like that? That's hack writing 101. There's a million of those writers shovelling out that drivel on LinkedIn (which sells them all the analytics they need to do it). I want to read blogs by people…

You could make the counter-argument: Why would I want to read something written by someone who doesn't care about their audience at all? Both of those are extreme positions.

> Why would I want to read something written by someone who doesn't care about their audience at all?

That's not what you described. You described a blog writtten by someone who wants to increase their reach.

Re: A blog does not need “analytics”

#63

Post by akoboldfrying »

diggan wrote: post #44
zachperkel wrote: post #37

The beauty of sharing things is the feedback you get from others, which then gives you validation that something you're interested in is something others are also interested in or derive value from. When making a blog post, how else do you get this feedback? 99% of people click, read it, then move on. Quantifying how many people have read, how long they spent reading, and where they came from, is an essential part of…

> The beauty of sharing things is the feedback you get from others I agree with this, less so with the validation part, but receiving feedback from others is lovely, pretty much always! But with that said, this isn't the goal or even intention for a lot of people who publish their written texts on the internet. Sometimes people just want to unload, share some tip, or any of the other countless of motivations people c…

I think there's an easy litmus test for everyone who claims not to care at all how many people read what they wrote:

Would you be as happy just saving that file to your hard drive, instead of publishing it online?

Re: A blog does not need “analytics”

#64

Post by TrueDuality »

_heimdall wrote: post #33
stevage wrote: post #3

The author lacks imagination or is not arguing entirely in good faith: > I realised that knowing about my website visitors had zero effect on anything in the real world. Perhaps that's true for them? But you don't have to try too hard to think of legitimate reasons why basic analytics are useful to any blog author who is trying to increase their reach, like knowing what topics are of most interest to their audience,…

I have always thought of blogs as being written primarily for the author. Maybe they write because they enjoy writing, or to think through something, or to leave notes for later. When someone does it for the audience I always consider it more of a publication. Maybe that just semantics, but that's been the distinction for me.

I write primarily as a means to collect my thoughts and outcomes around projects. I keep analytics on my site not to optimize for any particular audience but because it feels validating and that I'm contributing in another form.

I still see high traffic on a post explaining oddities in some of Route53's unintuitive behaviors and hope I'm making someone's day a little better in giving them a solution.

That drives me to write more.

Re: A blog does not need “analytics”

#65

Post by diggan »

akoboldfrying wrote: post #63
diggan wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The beauty of sharing things is the feedback you get from others I agree with this, less so with the validation part, but receiving feedback from others is lovely, pretty much always! But with that said, this isn't the goal or even intention for a lot of people who publish their written texts on the internet. Sometimes people just want to unload, share some tip, or any of the other countless of motivations people c…

I think there's an easy litmus test for everyone who claims not to care at all how many people read what they wrote: Would you be as happy just saving that file to your hard drive, instead of publishing it online?

I feel like that's missing that "putting it out there" or making some thoughts public is different than not doing so, regardless if you care about what happens afterwards or not.

Re: A blog does not need “analytics”

#67

Post by xattt »

_heimdall wrote: post #33
stevage wrote: post #3

The author lacks imagination or is not arguing entirely in good faith: > I realised that knowing about my website visitors had zero effect on anything in the real world. Perhaps that's true for them? But you don't have to try too hard to think of legitimate reasons why basic analytics are useful to any blog author who is trying to increase their reach, like knowing what topics are of most interest to their audience,…

I have always thought of blogs as being written primarily for the author. Maybe they write because they enjoy writing, or to think through something, or to leave notes for later. When someone does it for the audience I always consider it more of a publication. Maybe that just semantics, but that's been the distinction for me.

People seem to confuse writing in a blog with writing in a personal journal as part of self-therapy. Think “long-winded” posts on Livejournal.

It’s hard to engage in good-faith discussions because individuals may not have thought about the “why” yet, and it would be an embarrassing moment to be caught mid-discussion.

Re: A blog does not need “analytics”

#68

Post by PaulRobinson »

stevage wrote: post #3

The author lacks imagination or is not arguing entirely in good faith: > I realised that knowing about my website visitors had zero effect on anything in the real world. Perhaps that's true for them? But you don't have to try too hard to think of legitimate reasons why basic analytics are useful to any blog author who is trying to increase their reach, like knowing what topics are of most interest to their audience,…

You can do this with server side logs.

You don’t need to track users to get this insight, you can get all that insight from tracking server requests.

You may ask what’s the difference. Well, if I track you with in browser tech I can see everything you do.

If I look at the logs I’ll most likely just see a load of people from a single IP at your ISP which is a reverse proxy cache.

I’m fine with that. I don’t run any tracking, but I do look at logs now and again.

Re: A blog does not need “analytics”

#70

Post by palata »

I feel like nowadays, whatever you write for your blog will end up in an LLM and people will get the information from there.

So if you have a blog in the hope of getting a lot of traffic, well good luck.

The only reason I see to keep writing a blog in 2025 is to build your portfolio, which may be beneficial when looking for a job.

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