Ernest Alba's Blog

Limbo resolved. We're going off the air.

My blog has been in a state of limbo for a while now. I have been unable to post frequently or even regularly to it for several weeks now. I've wondered whether to continue posting to it. I think I'm in a place in my life where I no longer have the time or the need to release my thoughts upon a blog. I have written small essays whenever something interests me, but nothing compels me anymore to fashion them into a presentable text in order to share them with others.

This blog has been successful in many ways. First and foremost, it has allowed me to express myself. That was the original intent of the site, and it has been at the core of the reason for its existence. It has also helped me develop my writing skills and to develop my voice as a writer. It has taught me the value of being consistent in whatever I do - my blog has been most successful when I have most diligently applied myself to it. You will see this in more detail (with numbers!) below. I know the importance of creativity and hard work. A blog post sloppily written is a blog post not worth reading. And mark my words: people can tell when your post has not been finely tuned and edited to perfection. It's the difference between an enjoyable read accompanied by a willingness to return and a disappointing read accompanied by displeasure at the thought of returning.

If you are thinking about keeping a blog, here are some things I have learned that I believe are key to having a successful blog:

• Be consistent in your writing. I wrote my first blog post on January 4, 2005. To this day, it has received 921 views. It took more than a 100 posts and more than a year of writing to regularly get at least 2 or 3 thousand views.
  
• Write about things that get a lot of publicity outside of your blog. My film reviews were by far the most popular posts on my blog. They regularly got eight to ten thousand views after coming out - four times as many views as my other posts on my life, music, etc.
• Sex sells. Actually, only one type of sex sells - the kind that caters to middle-aged, white men. On the few occasions when I put up pictures of women (admittedly, women that fit one mold - not at all a feminist thing to do in many ways), I was surprised at how quickly views shot up. I am not so surprised anymore. The blog post that received the most views (more than 133,000 views) is one of Morgan Webb, for which I didn't write anything except an introductory sentence. Figures.
  
• Be topical. Film reviews that came out immediately were more likely to be seen. Avoid writing about events after people stopped caring. Like, I wouldn't write a critique of John Edwards's stances on the issues right now. Soon, it won't be important to write about Hillary Clinton's either.
• Don't follow your passions unless you're willing to take the hit. Views for my posts went back down below the one thousand mark once I veered off of films and women and started talking about classical music and feminist topics. Maybe you will continue to have interests that are common to many other people, but if not, you will likely have to re-evaluate your original reasons for maintaining a blog before making a choice about changing the trajectory of your blog content.

Well, that's all I have. Thank you (at this point, it's probably best to assume the singular pronoun "you") for reading. It's been wonderful.

ernest alba