Folks are unhappy “The Truth About Guns” Robert Farago was given an award by Second Amendment Foundation, and it’s prompting a discussion about whether gun blogging has jumped the shark. I was not pleased to see Robert Farago win an SAF award, only to turn around and mistreat Emily Miller by asking personal questions about her carry habits off the record and publishing it, nor headlining her bathroom habits, which I complained loudly about on Twitter, and which The Truth About Guns did not seem to appreciate. It is quite unfortunate that they lambast the Main Stream Media, and engage in the same kind of unethical reporting we took to blogging to escape. But I’m not certain why this should have any bearing on gun blogging as a whole. I’m certainly going to continue to do what I do without much regard to what awards the TTAG folks are or aren’t getting, and if people like what I have to say, great. To quote Uncle, “Remember, I do this to entertain me, not you.”
Category: Blogs
The Firearm Blog Acquired
Steve discussed the deal. Looks like they will get a makeover, but the content will stay the same. Steve has been proving that you can become a successful and popular commercial venture as a blog without being a dick about it, and for that, and also for his excellent content, we appreciate The Firearm Blog and wish them well with their new owners.
When Did Google Incoming Links Start Working?
It used to be, when I first started blogging, you tracked incoming links on Technorati, which did a pretty decent job of showing who was linking to you. Then Technorati kind of fell apart and out of favor, so everyone switched to tracking incoming links via Google. Unfortunately, Google kind of sucked at it, and you got so many spammy links that it practically was never worth it to even look. But for the first time in a while, I just looked at Google’s link tracking, and all the incoming links are legit. This pleases me, because a driver of blogosphere “conversation” is incoming links, and if you can’t see who’s talking about you, you can’t really join in. I am pleased to see this working well again.
What’s On Your Desktop?
Since gun news is slow, there’s a meme going around the gun blogosphere, here, here, here and here, of what’s been on your iPod the last month. I don’t have much to say there. My iPod looks more like Mitt Romney’s than Paul Ryan’s. I haven’t been listening to music much these past few months. I will recommend this album, which I recently got off iTunes, if you want some easy listening, and like the movie music of John Williams. I feel like changing up the meme a bit though, and suggest people reveal, “What’s your desktop?”
I have a dual-head display, so I get two pictures, depending on what monitor I look at. Both of these I took myself when we were out in Hawaii a few years ago. The main display is of Rabbit Island, just off Oahu’s eastern shore. The other display is the beach of Oahu’s North Shore, and isn’t far from where the Lost beach scenes were filmed. In fact, the “Others” village was walking distance behind me in this picture.
UPDATE: Not boring, fantastic.
UPDATE: This Desktop has gone to the dogs.
Excuses, Excuses
Sorry for the lack of posting, but this morning I was cast in a role as an extra in a film, and we just got finished shooting.
A Decade is a Long Time To Blog
SayUncle is ten years old. I’ll be surprised if I can make it that long, at least with the blog in its current form. This has been more of a hobby for me, and to be honest, I think blogging the politics of the gun issue is a bit too audience limiting to grow readership much beyond where it’s at now. The future is probably writing about guns and shooting, especially considering all the people getting into shooting these days.
Slow News Day
Not often that I run out of stories for the day before 2:00, but the well is dry. I don’t even have any tabs left to clear, except all the technical stuff I’ve been working on for the job that actually pays the bills, and a few things I’ve been sitting on that could turn into posts, but that would take a bit more time to write than I have time to take right now.
In the mean time, the gun blogosphere loves itself a good OC debate, so go see these posts by Caleb and Robb.
Free Ice Cream Machine
It’s jammed a bit today. Fridays are in-office days, and that often screws with my schedule, since it’s often the only day I’m not working from the home office. My commute here is an hour, sometimes more, so in-office days I lose 2+ hours of time on the drive. I live northeast of Philadelphia, and work pretty well west of Philadelphia. Blogging will resume shortly.
Something I’ve Thought About
Caleb is looking to hire a new writer. I’ve thought about bringing on writers to take some of the load off me, but this blog doesn’t generate enough revenue to pay anybody. I could bring a writer on as an unpaid Intern, and then maybe get an Intern for the Intern, but then I’d have to find a name for him.
Digging in The Enemy’s Backyard
Every once in a while I like to know where my readers come from, so I take a look. Fortunately, Google tracks this for me quite well:
This is a map by city. If I go by largest metro areas, they are DC, New York, Philadelphia, Chicago, and Los Angeles, in that order. Surprisingly, Boston is in my top ten. We are reaching behind enemy lines here at SNBQ, and that thrills me to no end. I’d also like to report we’re reaching a small number of people in London and Tel Aviv. Welcome.