Namely, “Holy shit, I’m still alive. WTF, over.”

But seriously, Navimie recently said something that covered all this perfectly. She asked me, doesn’t knowing that I’m part of a community that shows they do care about all this make a difference?

And it does.

Maybe what I did is self-censoring. Maybe the example I made, to remove content because someone else got upset and thought it damaged the community, gave the wrong message to other bloggers. “Ooh, if someone is upset by what you say, better take that down or don’t post it in the first palce. Only write safe things.”

I hope that isn’t the message people took from that. I didn’t take the post down and change it becvause I was asked to, but because the 2 million pagehits wasn’t the point of the post, it was the HOOK. I just changed the hook, reinforced my point, and moved on VERY happy with the results.

I have actually been contemplating writing an ultra-offensive post with my usual tongue in cheek humor, just to make sure nobody doubts that if my intent is to go off the wall, by god I CAN go off the wall. I’ve had a hellacious inspiration recently for a fun idea.

I read the post at The Stories of O and I totally disagree with that and agree with Gnomageddon. A blog is a public forum. If you want to write for the purity of writing, then thats okay. But to try and make people who obviously aren’t as pure and saintly feel sleazy is hardly that pure, is it? Its okay for O to engage with the community by bashing other people but its not okay for you to celebrate your success in engaging positively with the community? And yes I am now ‘bashing’ someone, but then I never claimed to be pure and saintly.

I write to be a part of a community. I don’t write to fulfil some deep inner need to expound on things, as cathartic as blog writing can be at times, I write to talk to other people. And those page hits and comments mean a lot to me. They are a sign that someone likes what I have to say. And I have page views because I write something people want to read. I am proud of that. Not everyone can manage that. I’ve kept going through some hard times in game and IRL. I should be proud of that. I’ve written 182 posts and have 343,523 page views and I am proud of it!

Ahem. I think there’s a huge difference between constantly talking about one’s pageviews, clickthroughs and the like versus celebrating a nice round number as a milestone.

Keep up the wonderful work :)

TBH, I think it’s full of shit. Your blog, your posts. Was Blizzard bragging when it stated it had 12 million subscribers? Who cares, as long as it’s true?

It’s normal. It’s heart-warming. I get to feel good with them, and appreciate their honest delight in having x number of people interacting with them and interested in what they have to say on a daily basis.

Anyone who would be offended by that must be new to the internet.

I think…..correct me if I’m wrong….that its not that you are happy and wrote a celebratory post….but…..that said person “interpretted” it as “bragging asshattery”……and that the Bear’s internal filters did not catch that it “may” be misinterpretted as such. Your not upset at the post, but in how it was “seen” by another and was “read” as bragging. Bear, we obviously love you….and your writing style…..cause we ALL come back to read what you write. IF we get offended or hurt or pissy…..we do the courtesy of leaving you comments. You did nothing wrong, nor is the filter system clogged or broken, some people are just more sensative then others and don’t wear their “big girl panties”. Sorry. Please don’t beat yourself up, and please, don’t EVER stop blogging…..unless it is to spend time with your amazing family!

Having said that……..I love you and the blog and consider you a “friend” accross the internets and definatly a brother from another mother!!! lol

Peas.