Are you reading this blog?

I've been looking at the Google Analytics stats for this blog; it's fascinating. I assumed it was just me 'reading' it, when I'd visit the page to check the posts look okay. But NO! There are other computers visiting - - which potentially means other humans are reading this blog (unless SkyNet has already gone live...).

Now, the most interesting part for me is where people are accessing this site. Here is a ranking of the cities where returning readers accessed the site, greatest number of visits first (July 31st until August 4th):

1. Glasgow
2. Los Angeles
3. Pelotas
4. Poplar
5. Rotterdam
6. West Hollywood

...and here are the top eight new visitor towns:

1. Los Angeles
2. New York
3. Glasgow
4. Denver
5. Belfast
6. Milton Keynes
7. Philadelphia
8. West Hollywood

The other new visitors were from: Albuquerque, Alexandria, Arnold, Barcelona, Bukit Mertajam, Centerville, Corona, Dallas, Durham, Fenton, Grenoble, Harrogate, Houston, Kensington, Las Vegas, London, Long Beach, Manhattan Beach, Memphis, Miami, Minneapolis, Oakland, Ocean View, Pinehurst, Pune, Rancho, Cucamonga, Richmond, Rotterdam, Santa Monica, Singapore, St Louis, Temecula, Temperance, Toronto, Troy, Vienna, Washington, Wilmington, Windsor.

That makes the top new visitor 'regions' as:

1. California
2. New York
3. England
4. Scotland
5. Colorado
6. Missouri
7. North Carolina
8. Northern Ireland
9. Ontario
10. Pennsylvania
11. Texas
12. Virginia

The other regions are: Barcelona, Delaware, District of Columbia, Florida, Maharashtra, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Mexico, Pulau Pinang, Rhône-Alpes, Tennessee, Vienna, Zuid-Holland.

Finally, this means that the new visitors are from:

1. United States
2. United Kingdom
3. Canada
4. Austria
5. France
6. India
7. Malaysia
8. Netherlands
9. Singapore
10. Spain

The best news is that there are plenty of lovely people out there reading this... So why not say 'hello'? Click on the link to the right to get my email address or copy&paste this into your email but remove all the dashes: p-a-n-o-p-t-i-f-i-e-r-@-g-m-a-i-l-.-c-o-m

Are you writing a blog I should be reading? Are you preferring particular topics? Are you accidentally visiting this site expecting something else? :)

Stop what you are doing and head to Historypin!

A completely genius idea that is being used for good! Hooray! Historypin allows GoogleMap StreetView to meld with Picassa photo repository to create a verifiable comparison for any site in the world (that has been Google-SV mapped) with images of it in bygone times. Plus they are developing a way of informing your digital camera of when you are in the correct position to replicate a famous photograph (such as the VJ Day kiss in Times Square).

Simply marvellous!

Mapping reality

Hat-tip to Jeremy from the Foucault Blog.

Here is a link to a marvellous mapping project whereby over 17 days a researcher walked the campus of Warwick to produce a pedestrian map. The walker included amusing and useful false steps - paths that are not normally taken but when added to the map provide scale, compass, etc.


You really should stop and look at it.

More visual stimuli

Maps are very handy at understanding political developments:
C19th Europe 1815-1848
WWI 1914-1918
Interwar years 1918-1920
WWII June 1941-1942

The Holocaust is also hauntingly depicted in the animated map here.