September 24, 2009
Sooooooo how did this whole BLOG thing work out? Not so well. It is an easier way to write my stories, and easier to keep track of comments, but it did not reach the audience I had hoped for. I sent a notice to about 50 people that my BLOG would be where you could all find my stories. I also told you all that you could subscribe to get notified when new content showed up on the site. 3 people subscribed. When I got back, a dozen or so people asked me if I had gone on the Ironbutt Rally yet. Most of these were people that were truly interested in my trips, they were just not the kind of people that use the computer for much more than e-mail. They apparently saw my original notification mail, but never did anything about it. They did not even know that I crashed my bike and totalled it. There is no real way for me to register these people to my site, nor should there be, as that would be an invasion of privacy.
What now? I am planning on going back to my old practice of sending e-mail notifications to my readers. I will use my WhereIsBobL Gmail account, as it allows a lot of recipients. I will still use the BLOG to write my stories, and to organize comments, and you can still register there. I will still move the better stories over to my web site eventually. But when I write something, I will notify all the people on my list that I have a new story. Sometimes this will just be a link to the story, sometimes it will be the story itself. It will be delayed some, so if you want to know what is going on right now, you should go to my BLOG.