Reflections

Warning: navel-gazing follows. Lack of content may offend some viewers.

This blog has grown quite nicely of late. It took me three months to get my first thousand visitors. The last thousand has taken merely a week. Perhaps the most noticable change is regarding the comments - I actually receive some now! It's great. Sincere thanks to all those who offer their thoughts: I find your supportive/challenging [select one] feedback to be one of the most rewarding aspects of blogging.

New readers are encouraged to peruse the archives. I hardly ever post on current events, which means that most of my old posts are as relevant/interesting today as they were the day I wrote them. Of course, that doesn't help much if they were never very interesting to begin with, but one hopes there's enough variety there that you'll find something to your taste.

I've manually created my own system of archives-by-category, as displayed on the sidebar. Each category contains the list of my posts on that topic, with a brief descriptive overview to accompany each link. I find it invaluable myself when I need to dig up an old post, but I imagine it could also be of use to visitors - so feel free to take advantage of it!

Blogging has fast become my favourite hobby. One benefit I find from it is intellectual: it motivates me to explore ideas and develop thoughts that I would otherwise likely neglect. Another nice aspect (which overlaps to some extent) was well-described by Maverick Philosopher a while back:

Many of us used to complain of lack of community. We looked for it in colleagues, neighbors, and relatives, but to no avail. We agreed with the sentiment of Emerson: "I do not visit the homes of my relatives, for I do not like to be alone." (Quoted from memory.) We looked for, but did not find, that commonality of interests, aspirations, and attitudes that make for community.

But the Internet, or more precisely, the World Wide Web, has changed all of that. E-mail was the beginning, personal websites the next step, and now with weblogs we have arrived. You cast your line out into the blogospheric depths, and damned if you don’t snag some highly interesting characters!

More recently, Jason Kuznicki (of Asan Heresy fame) also discussed some of his blogospheric neighbours - which included some very generous remarks about me and this blog! (Incidentally, he plans to start up a gay-libertarian group blog. Alas, I don't qualify on either count - but if you do, you may wish to check if he's looking for more contributors.)

It'll be interesting to see if a sense of community begins to develop here at all. I already have a high regard for several of my 'neighbours' - particularly Jason, Chris, and Brandon. (I may disagree with Brandon on a lot of issues, but one would be hard pressed to find a more pleasant and agreeable opponent!) And of course there are many other quality bloggers I haven't mentioned, as you can see for yourself by following the links on my sidebar and extended blogroll. Several have also become (semi-)regular commenters at this site, which is a promising development!