It went from bad to worse.
It shouldn’t really matter. I mean, I really like running this site, no matter how many people visit on a regular basis… but the analytics were still off by a lot more than I expected.
It’s mainly attacks from server farms, China, Russia, Ukraine, and various other hackers who routinely visit the site in order to scan for security weaknesses. It made the site appear to have more visitors than it actually did. I added some new rules to the htaccess file in order to bail them overboard so I could see truer numbers. The results were a little disheartening.
First of all, I should mention what I did. I added a few simple lines to the .htaccess file that redirected any visitor who snoops around wp-login or wp-config to google.com. That was it. For some reason my stat counter considers these valid visits when they obviously aren’t. The htaccess redirect prevents them from ever actually reaching this site.
The good news is that after redirecting those obvious bots, the number of visitors is not zero. Real people actually come here, and some of you come here on a fairly regular basis. Thanks for that. It means a lot, and I appreciate your choosing Flush Twice.
The bad news is, the numbers are embarrassingly low, and if you take away the people who googled “Ginger Jokes”, it gets even lower still. The total number of visits from actual humans is currently under fifty per day. All things considered it’s really not that bad, as it always appears to be over thirty.
Back in its heyday, Flush Twice was getting over 500 uniques per day. That may sound like bullshit, but back then, there weren’t as many cool websites to visit, and I was able to plug this site in forums. Today, plugging a site on a forum can get you banned or doxed, so I’m not taking any chances. Also, people have a lot more choices and slicker marketing campaigns targeting them. Small, independent sites like Flush Twice get shoved to the side, and nearly forgotten.
You also have to take into consideration that many internet users hang out on Twitter, Facebook. Pintrest, YouTube, and other heavyweight sites. They don’t have any incentive to venture out from their walled gardens, and so they don’t. Strangely, even when a heavyweight site noticeably increases their agitation level, they still won’t leave it. (I know this because I had to kick my own unhealthy addiction to reddit.)
But you came here today, and for that I thank you.
Pax,
-f2x
PS: In case you noticed (which I doubt, but still…) I changed the category for these asides from “News” to “Sunday Rant”. It should be fairly obvious as to why: It’s not really news, I’m usually ranting, and except for about three posts, they’re always on a Sunday. So there you have it. If you were thinking, “Hey did it always say ‘Sunday Rant’?”, it’s not your mind playing tricks, I really did change it.
