Writing for Readers, Not Algorithms
By FARHA GUERRERO
I look at analytics far more than I would like to admit.
This is a part of Bear Blog that is built in. Bloggers can see how many unique visitors have come to their page, how many reads they have had on any given day, the countries readers come from, and how people arrive at the page.
Herman, the founder, may have included this because it gives bloggers more impetus to continue writing. It is satisfying to know that since I launched this blog in March, I have had over a thousand unique visitors and about 1,770 unique reads.
But this post is not celebrating a milestone or the fact that I know which blog posts were the most popular. My goal in launching this blog was not to have followers, but rather to have readers.
Because Bear Blog is privacy-first and has no trackers, ads, or scripts, I feel that the numbers match what I already know. I am not on any social media platform, so my blog is not being visited through places like Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram, and very few come through Google.
I also know that the majority of people who visit the pages come from Canada. That makes sense because, after each radio interview on The Blue Hour, I share the page with the guest, who may also share it with colleagues or friends.
And then there are those personal sharings. A friend of mine told me that she shares my blog with her friends.
So in essence, anyone else coming to my blog is coming of their own volition.
This is really the crux of this post. People come to my blog because they want to. There is no algorithm and there are no likes. I may never meet the individuals who land on these pages.
But it pleases me to know that I have them.
The bareness ʕ•ᴥ•ʔ of the blog tells me something. It feels like a place where one might find something that recalls the old internet.
Given the way this blog is built, I feel confident that I do not have the kind of visitors that exist in the bot world, trolling the internet.
And something else has evolved that I find very interesting. I now see the blog not only as a place to house my philosophical ramblings, links to my radio interviews, and published writing. It is also evolving into a sort of archive.
Each transcript of every interview is now on this blog, along with links to the guests’ research and publications. It is beginning to feel, to me at least, like an online archive waiting to be tapped into.
My goal as a writer, and now certainly as a radio host, is to share knowledge with others.
If someone can learn something while scrolling through this site, I feel very grateful. It is that simple.
Someone may find this blog because they are interested in something as niche as the search for exoplanets, how philosophers understand analogical reasoning, the soundscapes of medieval Europe, or how a speaker of a very rare language like Haida is doing her best to keep it alive.
All of this makes what I do feel more meaningful.
So this is also a post about gratitude.
To those readers who seem to return consistently, including two readers from the United States who often come to my page shortly after I post: whoever you are, thank you for being here.