Interesting activity on the blog

 

Well this is very gratifying (I think) but it is a little bit strange. The usual hits on this blog have hung around 50 a day for the last year and a bit (and thank you very much for coming back to look) but over the last week, something else has happened. The day before yesterday I suddenly had about 150 hits, and thought (smugly perhaps) "Well that post really hit the spot". Although I didn't know why.

Then yesterday there were 150 more, then today there were 150 before lunchtime, and by the end of today there will be 500, by the looks of it. 

Now I know that I am still not getting into Mr Beast territory, and I don't think monetization is on the horizon, but I was curious enough to dig into the stats. The surprise is that suddenly about 35% of the traffic comes from Hong Kong, about 35% from Singapore and about 25% from Mexico!

Now if I do indeed have new readers from those countries I welcome you indeed, but it might be that there is some other explanation which my more computer-literate readers will be able to tell me about. Could this be the location for AI content-scrapers? Will people suddenly find that the word 'spoddish' is being suggested to them by Chat GPT when they try to blog on the intellectual-cheap? Or have you all suddenly taken to using VPNs in other countries, so that the hits from abroad are misleading?

Whatever the reason, I have the simple teenage pleasure of watching my website counter tick up (like the unfortunate Walter White Jr in Breaking Bad, if you have seen that episode). I may choose to believe that my words are reaching new lands, but to be honest I will not be completely convinced till someone replies in the comments to fess up as new readers in the three countries I mentioned.

I live in hope. And also seek enlightenment from my computer guru homeys.