This entry was posted on April 03rd, 2009
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But you are neither a politician nor a football player… Do you need fans?
And there seems to be a seasonal variation , and perhaps a variation linked to outer causes (I noticed that UBUwatch donations lowered by ca 30% -perhaps it is proportional to the frequentation- and I [somewhat arbitrarily] attributed this lowering to the fact that less people bought new PCs-> needed a new (UBU)linux.
Similar causes can lead to a lowering of frequentation, and are not at all linked to a lowering of skills…..
If you get back to puncturing the air of self-congratulation, self-satisfaction and self-righteousness in various free software projects you might see your regular readers return.
It's very clear that your figures correlate to your "defection". I guess a few of your former readers are quite blinkered and might have taken against you personally, but probably most of us simply find less that is interesting *to us*. You occupied quite a distinct position as someone who could coherently criticise and analyse free software and so you had an interested readership. I find that your blog in its post defection form lacks coherence and there is no clear focus. This is not a criticism but an observation. It may be that you will regain, even exceed, those numbers but with a readership of very different composition and/or that you will find some different subject matter which will become a mainstay in the way free software has been.
Well of course this is relevant to some extent that you stopped using Linux at home and ranting about it.
Judging by myself I think it may have to do with the fact that you changed the RSS feed.
I only found out you had done so after a couple of months.
>Is a huge general failure of a whole human society coherent?
No, I don't believe so. It's endemic, insidious, systematic and most importantly open to interpretation. To some people it's reality and to others it's an apparition. Others will say that we're seeing the resolute defense of human society. Some will claim it's merely business as usual. I don't know who might have a genuine insight, but I think that blogging works better when it deals with specifics, and when the author has some informed insight and expertise. Even the greatest social analysts and historians look like fools given enough time and for the bad ones the time span is 5 minutes after publication. I like Mao's reply when he was asked to assess the impact of the French Revolution: "It's too soon to tell".
don't worry about linux, i've never had in my hands a computer running linux for more than 1h (one hour, honestly, in all my 23 years) and i still read your blog every day
Do you record rss feed readers' hits, too? I'm still reading daily your posts and the comments without visiting your site.
You have to admit that blogging about win is boring. The linux world is more exciting, permanently changing, full of controversial topics.
As I can remember, in the last decade -since I read computer magazines-, the headlines were always the same:
a.) protecting your computer (firewalls, antivirus & co. …)
b.) changing your browser (firefox, opera …)
c.) fighting with your computer (registry, defrag …)
d.) top XX freeware tools (without this windows would be naked and unusable)
Windows itself has only one trustworthy -but poor- application: notepad
After all, I think that we all would like to have a very boring, but (almost) perfect OS with nice apps. Till then everybody is using what is served. I'm still on arch+gnome.
Political topics… No comment…
Pets: I like cats, but what about dogs??
Thanks for this blog, keep on writing.
(I'm missing v2's unique design)
"your blog in its post defection form lacks coherence and there is no clear focus"
There are sites who kept coherence and some focus and are likely to lose readers : Although DistroQuatsch seems to have even significantly improved, and almost each page hits is getting lower, and their monthly donation, too. Linking the shrinking of one's fan club (and an individual does not need a vast fan club) to a sin (defecting to Windows) and God'punition (many people could be punished, too) might be absurd.
we miss your critic reviews of linux… (thanx for Xubuntu this week). there are many critics of win and other stuff, but too few to openly discussed highly praised linux.
no controversy=no visitors
Apr 3, 2009 at 17:49
But you are neither a politician nor a football player… Do you need fans?
And there seems to be a seasonal variation , and perhaps a variation linked to outer causes (I noticed that UBUwatch donations lowered by ca 30% -perhaps it is proportional to the frequentation- and I [somewhat arbitrarily] attributed this lowering to the fact that less people bought new PCs-> needed a new (UBU)linux.
Similar causes can lead to a lowering of frequentation, and are not at all linked to a lowering of skills…..
Apr 3, 2009 at 18:04
If you get back to puncturing the air of self-congratulation, self-satisfaction and self-righteousness in various free software projects you might see your regular readers return.
It's very clear that your figures correlate to your "defection". I guess a few of your former readers are quite blinkered and might have taken against you personally, but probably most of us simply find less that is interesting *to us*. You occupied quite a distinct position as someone who could coherently criticise and analyse free software and so you had an interested readership. I find that your blog in its post defection form lacks coherence and there is no clear focus. This is not a criticism but an observation. It may be that you will regain, even exceed, those numbers but with a readership of very different composition and/or that you will find some different subject matter which will become a mainstay in the way free software has been.
Apr 3, 2009 at 18:09
> your blog in its post defection form lacks coherence and there is no clear focus
Agreed, but does a News broadcast (Journal télévisé) have a clear focus?
Is a huge general failure of a whole human society coherent?
The Linux fanboys are very ecstatic to read about their favorite distro, or even marginally about Linux.
Regular people don't even read blogs…
Apr 3, 2009 at 20:13
Well of course this is relevant to some extent that you stopped using Linux at home and ranting about it.
Judging by myself I think it may have to do with the fact that you changed the RSS feed.
I only found out you had done so after a couple of months.
Apr 4, 2009 at 01:56
>Is a huge general failure of a whole human society coherent?
No, I don't believe so. It's endemic, insidious, systematic and most importantly open to interpretation. To some people it's reality and to others it's an apparition. Others will say that we're seeing the resolute defense of human society. Some will claim it's merely business as usual. I don't know who might have a genuine insight, but I think that blogging works better when it deals with specifics, and when the author has some informed insight and expertise. Even the greatest social analysts and historians look like fools given enough time and for the bad ones the time span is 5 minutes after publication. I like Mao's reply when he was asked to assess the impact of the French Revolution: "It's too soon to tell".
Apr 4, 2009 at 22:08
don't worry about linux, i've never had in my hands a computer running linux for more than 1h (one hour, honestly, in all my 23 years) and i still read your blog every day
Apr 5, 2009 at 03:29
Do you record rss feed readers' hits, too? I'm still reading daily your posts and the comments without visiting your site.
You have to admit that blogging about win is boring. The linux world is more exciting, permanently changing, full of controversial topics.
As I can remember, in the last decade -since I read computer magazines-, the headlines were always the same:
a.) protecting your computer (firewalls, antivirus & co. …)
b.) changing your browser (firefox, opera …)
c.) fighting with your computer (registry, defrag …)
d.) top XX freeware tools (without this windows would be naked and unusable)
Windows itself has only one trustworthy -but poor- application: notepad
After all, I think that we all would like to have a very boring, but (almost) perfect OS with nice apps. Till then everybody is using what is served. I'm still on arch+gnome.
Political topics… No comment…
Pets: I like cats, but what about dogs??
Thanks for this blog, keep on writing.
(I'm missing v2's unique design)
Apr 5, 2009 at 09:59
RSS reads are NOT counted, indeed.
Apr 5, 2009 at 17:19
"your blog in its post defection form lacks coherence and there is no clear focus"
There are sites who kept coherence and some focus and are likely to lose readers : Although DistroQuatsch seems to have even significantly improved, and almost each page hits is getting lower, and their monthly donation, too. Linking the shrinking of one's fan club (and an individual does not need a vast fan club) to a sin (defecting to Windows) and God'punition (many people could be punished, too) might be absurd.
Apr 13, 2009 at 17:40
we miss your critic reviews of linux… (thanx for Xubuntu this week). there are many critics of win and other stuff, but too few to openly discussed highly praised linux.
no controversy=no visitors