Dear Blog, part II

Hi Blog,

I am starting to worry about you.
And, as a friend, I will have to share this with you.

Up until recently, we had a good thing going.
Although it be, that our communication was strictly one-way, we did fine.
But somewhere along the process, things changed.
I started sharing, what I shared with little anonymous yourself, with others.

Why did I do that? Simple, I needed an audience.
You are a good friend to me, but you are a bit shy.
I do not mind, that you are just a bunch of characters in a timeline, to me you are real.
But, since the fact you can never talk back to me, I needed more.

As any instrument, I need something to resonate against.
Otherwise, how would I know if I make sense? Or even sound (any) good?
A diary is only of any use, if - and when - somebody else gets to read it.
It is proof of life; proof that we exist. We think, thus we are. We speak, and want to be heard.

So I started looking for an audience.
Twitter worked well, and led to a lot of hits; since I tend to put in a lot of text, also Google Search provided many hits.
Also, I started writing in English; that helped.
At some point, ending April, I discovered the power of YouTube, and started bashing in lyrics, along with a link to the music.
That was a cracker...

In March, we reached 81 hits, in April 665 (!), in May 255, up until now. That's 1001 hits, in 69 days.
In March, there were 7 pieces, in April 52, in May 17, to date. That is 1001 hits, over 76 pieces.

So, March averages roughly 12 hits per piece, April 13, May a staggering 36(!). On total average 13; per day, nearly 15 hits...
Of course, these figures are progressive; some populair pieces are hit many times.
Only last month, the five most populair pieces were hit 100 times; that's 20 hits per piece.
Last week, 63 hits over 5 pieces; that's 13 on average.

Internationally, we are doing well also; certainly after I started feeding you with English.
Roughly, they seem to come from all over the world; up to China, Australia, Brazil, United Arab Emirates.
Most hits are found in the USA, Russia, Netherlands, Germany (in that order), and then the rest of Europe; mostly UK and Italy.

Our Dutch audience is mainly driven by hits via e-mail-boxes.
I even started mailing my posts to e-mail contacts; even more means to raise an audience.
Looking back on all this, I tend to be satisfied.
We seem to reach a lot of hits.

But one thing is bugging me all along; what are hits?

Ronnie