1-0-0, That Spells 100!

Well, it might be silly to some, but I can’t help but celebrate a little that this is my 100th post! It’s 100, you know? 100 posts in about four months. Again, maybe that doesn’t sound much to you, but I did not expect that to happen when I started this blog in May and I certainly didn’t expect to hit that mark so soon. But here we are and I want to spend the time today with reflecting and analyzing what happened in that time and in my posts. So the same as I’m doing all the time, just a bit more meta and self-indulgent.

How It All…

In the beginning I had no real plan what this blog will be like. I was inspired by Noam Chomsky to do something, I wanted to write because that’s what I can do best when I’m inspired so I settled on a blog. The other main inspiration beside Chomsky was Man of Steel. After seeing it, I just couldn’t stop thinking about it day and night, so I decided to write my thoughts down and that more or less set my routine ever since. I write about a movie on one day and something else on the other day and almost naturally all my other series evolved, almost naturally, waiting in the back of my mind for years to come out. But before this becomes too much of a boring memoir, let’s talk some facts.

The Facts

I wrote 99,955 words in the last 99 posts, making it an average of 1,009 words per post. About 1,000 words per day seems absurd to me, considering the time I have as a father and teacher (no, not much). But it somehow worked out. The longest posts were 4,493 words on 12 Years a Slave, followed by the 3,498 words on Never Let Me Go and 3,064 words on Looper (which made me realize I could split posts). The shortest real post was Skyline, with a mere 221 words, which is probably more than the movie deserves. Movies obviously constitute the most articles (47), followed by music (16), school (11) and thoughts (9).

The most favorite articles surprise me a little, though I’m not sure what I had expected. The film list is the most viewed thing on the blog, followed by the first episode of You Belong on the Radio (although there seems to be someone or –thing that needs to click on one of the covers there almost every day, so that doesn’t really count). Then follows The Flow You Know and Going with the Flow, and that surprises me. Actually, many of the non-movie, non-music, non-anything posts are among the most popular: various Why posts (Teacher, Vegan, Being a Teacher), Michael Brown, many posts on school. The various analysis posts also work well (You Belong on the Radio, Poster of a Girl and Inventing the Child) as does 3 Months of Movies (for which part 2 is due in a few weeks). The first movie post comes in at no.15 (Miami Vice, of all things), which I didn’t expect for a movie-focused blog. Some of this is hard to be sure of, especially since in the first weeks, I didn’t have the “read more” option on the posts, so that many older posts have less views. The only post that was viewed only once is Skyline, probably because it’s not a well-known move. Also down there are several comics and Did I Like This? posts, maybe because both are more fringe topics that not everyone is interested in. I will still keep on with them, though.

I never at all planned to write so much about the depiction of women in various media, but it just seems like the most common problem in movies, posters and songs. I thought I write more about authority and society in general, but I think this will happen more in the future. Not that I don’t want to write about female characters because I obviously think it’s an important topic.

I’m most happy with the movie posts of Man of Steel, 12 Years a Slave and Looper because they’re so extensive. But I also enjoyed the Flow and Teacher Looks at Class posts a lot, because they allowed me to write something more fictional. And I always enjoy the poster and charts posts, too. But I enjoy most of the posts here, otherwise I wouldn’t write them.

Most visitors come from Germany, followed by the U.S., Canada and France. The last three weeks had the most visitors since I started, which makes me hopeful that this is a trend.

Is there anything else that’s interesting? (just in case any of this was interesting)

The Future

I’ve been writing almost daily since July, which took its toll on me a little. It’s stressful and rewarding at the same time. I decided to take Sunday off two weeks ago and I’ll probably have another post-less day soon, just to keep my stress level lower and to enjoy the writing more.

My routine of topics isn’t likely to change very much. I will still try to always analyze movies on a different and not just movie-making level, and will also stay focused on what I find problematic with our society. Once I start reading Daniel Quinn with my course soon, I’ll probably start to write more about where I (or Quinn) think these problems come from and what can be done about them.

The blog will change more drastically soon in its design and location, but I’ll announce that when it’s done.

As always, I’m happy for any feedback (knowing there won’t be much) and I will continue enjoying this and being happy about any new visitors, readers and followers. It’s been a pleasure to see this blog grow slowly and I’m excited for the future. See you there!

Again, please vote here. Thanks!