JAYNE PONDERS THE DECLINE OF BLOGS. OR NOT

So I'm reading the Sunday papers (The New York Times, Sunday Styles section just to be clear about the source. Hey, I'm a former librarian, I always credit the source) and there's this piece titled "Blogs Falling in an Empty Forest" by Douglas Quenqua. The article points out that a lot of blogs have gone fallow, so to speak. They have either stalled out altogether or are only updated occasionally. Other blogs have moved to the social networking sites.

But here at RWQ we are going into our fourth year and we are still going strong. In fact, our traffic has actually grown over time, not declined. Clearly we are bucking the trend. According to the stats we pull around 1500 - 2000 pageviews per day. That translates into 10,000 to 16,000 hits. No, we're not one of those hot political blogs but we're hot, nonetheless.

The question that arises is, how the heck have we survived? I have some theories.

First, there are (thank goodness!) six of us here to carry the load. That means that we each blog only once every other week. None of us is under the extreme stress of trying to blog every day or even once a week. That, in turn, gives our visitors a wide variety of voices and topics. You never know what you're going to see when you tune into RWQ.

Second, RWQ is a book-and-author oriented blog. That means that we tend to attract visitors who are -duh! — interested in books and writing. Cool crowd. What's more, it is by definition a literate crowd that is intrigued by all things associated with books and writing. Once again, a very cool group of folks.

Third, RWQ has, from the very beginning, always been a friendly, civil, cheerful community of bloggers and visitors. Yes, we do a little whining from time to time but we always serve cheese with that whine.

Fourth: RWQ has survived. This is no small thing in the modern world where fads and trends tend to come and go at lightning speed. And we have survived because of you, our hardy band of regular visitors. You have made this blog a genuine online community and we thank you for that. Couldn't have done it without you.

Now, let's hear from you. Why do you come back to RWQ and what have you noticed about the rise and fall of other blogs? What's your take on the blog scene?

Sincerely,

Jayne