About a year ago, I started checking the stats on this blog. I was feeling insecure, wondering if I was blathering on to an empty house. The exercise of writing daily was an end to itself, but the thought of putting time into posting a public blog that no one read was a possibility that was going to defeat me. I needed to know that at least it was being read. I didn’t worry so much that people enjoyed it or agreed with it. But just that its existence was noted.
Initially I had a few dozen hits a day, representing about as many viewers. That was enough to beat down my feelings of insecurity and futility.
Over the past year, I’ve checked in periodically to see how the numbers are going. I no longer feel the pangs of insecurity that no one is reading. Enough of you comment, critique and encourage to keep me thinking out loud. I remember when the blog consistently began breaking 100 views per day. It felt legitimating, somehow.
When the stats indicated about 100 people a day (I’ve learned it’s far from an exact science) accounted for about 500 views, I began to feel a little insecure that perhaps too many people were reading. I worried for a while that someone would complain about copyright infringement (I try to track down my pic owners when I can, but I admit to reposting liberally), or that haters would stumble upon me and try to get nasty. I don’t go looking for sour energy in my life, and the thought that a reader would get pissy with me for one reason or another made rising hit numbers seem a little ominous.
In the past couple of months, hits are regularly topping a thousand a day with about 400 or so viewers. I’m confident a lot of these represent people who stumble into the room looking for an entirely different party, and who exit just as quickly. But I’m also aware that many of you are regular readers who share a kink, a sense of humor, and a lust for beautiful men wrestling with one another. Other than a lot of spammers trying to comment with trojan horse links, almost no one has tried to be nasty (1 snarky killjoy tried to get up in my face about 6 months ago about copyright infringement for my reposts of Rock Hard Wrestling pics, which fortunately I had written permission for… so there…). The numbers themselves don’t add up to much of anything to me anymore. The comments on the blog, and the beautiful messages I frequently get when people sign up for one of the wrestling fiction groups mean a whole lot more to me.
But I just have to ask, what happened yesterday!? Nearly 600 people accounted for about 1,500 hits. Sure, my post on the most recent Naked Kombat match was profoundly insightful and existentially provocative, but the dramatic uptick is a little astonishing.
I realize that for most internet publishers, the numbers game means something other than what it means to me. I’ve heard from a couple of producers of homoerotic wrestling that this blog accounts for a good number of click-throughs to their retail sites, which can account for cash flow and financial viability in hard times for these fine companies. All the better, if you ask me. I’m thrilled to have a lot of wrestling kink companies out there making enough profit to keep them producing, creative, and innovating (please, keep being creative and innovating). I don’t advertise here, though, and I don’t take donations. So for me, the numbers are more a curiosity. It’s what they represent that means a lot more to me. They represent a lot of us who share a common interest, an eye for hot guys and wrestling, and a desire to be connected in one way or another. So thanks for reading, and keep the comments coming. An encouraging word, a common interest, a different perspective, or a piece of original fiction to share is worth infinitely more to me than a stat counter. In response to the message I hear over and over again, let me just say one again to everyone: no, you are most certainly not alone.
By the way, the photos complimenting todays post are a theme set. I won’t give it away, but I know that you all are an astonishingly clever lot who will have figured out the common theme anyway. If not, enjoy the puzzle.
Sidelineland 
Congratulations on the excellent numbers, Bard. You don't give yourself enough credit for what is a consistently well written and entertaining blog. I understand your concerns about attracting the wrong kind of attention–or, at the other extreme, hearing crickets when you finish a post. For the sake of a sense of scale, according to Google Analytics, my blog has never got much more than a third of your 1500, and it's been straddling 55 for the past two weeks or so–and those numbers represent visits, not visitors. Like you, I am not affected by the "numbers game" because the blog is not a source of income. What matters most (to me) is the opportunity to try to put my thoughts and feelings into words and keep a scrapbook of some of the images that resonate with me–and it's wonderful, too, when others, many or few, find something there that matters to them as well. Your observations on a variety of subjects are important to me and, no doubt, your other readers too. I'm a faithful follower and enthusiastic fan. Keep up the good work. (And, no, I am not clever enough to pick up on today's theme–but I do know that, when I do finally understand, I will probably be kicking myself for advertising my cluelessness here.)
I'd miss you if you weren't on the internet! Sometimes I want to write more but stop for fear of making you feel stalked.I have to admit that I wasn't a part of yesterday's increase, because after the Talbot True Blood link a few days ago, I needed to stay away from the computer for a while. (It's probably good I don't get Showtime or HBO or Starz or whatever channel it's on, because that one clip left me feeling kind of turned on and sad the whole rest of the day. Yes, I know, I have problems.) Don't get me wrong though–I loved the post, and the link! And have since gone back and caught up on everything.
Keep up the good work. You're doing a fantastic job.