The View From Here

I don't really know exactly what the connection is, but I know there's something going on.

This year I've started blogging here on Blogger.com and also on Wordpress. I have hit counters on both sites. There haven't been many visits to either site--this one is still under 300 on the counter and my Wordpress stats say that I've had under 100 hits there, and yet...

...the akismet comment filter on my Wordpress blog says it has blocked about 120 spam comments so far and I seem to be getting a lot of unsolicted advertising in my regular email inbox.

I'm hesitant to call these messages spam since they seem to be from reasonably respectable sources, such as Oprah Winfrey's diet plan (um, couple of questions there*) Rewards For Shoppers and a few others instead of the more instantly-recognizable spam-mail with disposable addresses. All the same, I marked them as spam and sent them away because i never asked these people for any info.

How does a blog that exisits in near-total obscurity generate spam? How do they manage to not even cause a click on my hit-counter?

I hope to provide some of the kind of writing and the kind of thought that you might not see elsewhere on the web: things to make you see things in a different light, things that might make you think for yourself, things that might make you laugh or feel better or know that there's someone else out here in this big world who thinks about stuff.

I don't freak out over a few spam emails. I just don't open them. It takes more than a little bit of spam to discourage a Bobzilla. But there is a footnote here for Oprah:

*I don't need to lose any weight. I'm six feet tall and I weigh about 160. In addition, even though I don't watch television AT ALL, I am aware of Ms. Winfrey's battles with extra pounds that come and go and come back again and go away again, then come back again. IF I WAS GOING TO GO ON A DIET PLAN (which I'm not) the Oprah Winfrey diet would be THE VERY LAST diet plan I would consider. I am completely UN-interested in the Oprah Winfrey Diet. Thanks.