My Internet Stat Porn Monthly Report (13) September

This is my thirteenth monthly round-up of blog figures for anyone who is remotely interested in who reads my little blog. These stats for the month of September come courtesy of google analytics.

After the August malfunction, normality has resumed although the re-setting of the Google Analytics link to my blog has thrown up some new and rather odd statistics.

Calming Down
The start of my second full year in blogging has been a relatively quiet one.

My output for the month of 21 blog posts is my lowest since last November when I blogged 19 times. This was mainly through my week away in Birmingham when I left the laptop at home.

In September, I had a total of 3,636 absolute unique visitors to my blog (down on my May record of 6,485). Those 3,636 absolute unique visitors made 3,859 visits to my blog in September (down on the 6,908 record from May). They did however view 9,725 pages which was only marginally eclipsed by the May best of 9,738 pageviews.

The top 10 stories by direct page views that you've read this month were:

1. Rory McIlroy - A Leap of Faith to Join the Immortals of Golf
2. Labour's Leighton Andrews' Extraordinary Live TV Coco Pops Outburst
3. Wembley Bound with Swansea City AFC!
4. Johann Hari: A Personal Apology
5. Andy Murray Needs to Summon the Rory McIlroy Spirit for Sporting Immortality
6. A Gareth Epps Sized Lib Dem Conference Farce
7. Happy 65th Birthday Freddie Mercury
8. 'The King's Speech' - The Book Vs The Film (SPOILER WARNING!)
9. Brian Blessed, Chancellor of Cambridge University?!
10. Red or Black? Ant & Dec Win Either Way

Of the 10, only 3 were written this month - the other 7 are popular blog posts written in months past that continue to attract hits. The 3 that I wrote this month came in at No.4, 7 and 10 - revolving around Johann Hari, Freddie Mercury and Ant and Dec's ITV Show Red or Black?

During the course of the month, my Rory McIlroy - A Leap of Faith to Join the Immortals of Golf blog post remained at No.1 for the fourth month running and has now become my blog's most read post of all-time.

Blog Traffic
Of all of the blog visitors this past month, 12.52% were through direct traffic, 25.92% came from referring sites and 61.56% via search engines.

The bounce rate for the month was 8.01% which seems remarkably low to me (as opposed to a bounce rate of 67.78% for the past year).

An International Blog!
The visitors to my little blog came from 98 countries/territories this month - down from the May record of 123, with a cumulative total of 166 countries/territories having supplied visitors to my blog to date.

The top ten countries to date are as follows (with position change from August & % of total views):

1. United Kingdom (No Change) 50.9% (+1.3%)
2. United States (No Change) 19.7% (-0.6%)
3. Germany (No Change) 2.3% (-0.1%)
4. Canada (No Change) 2.2% (-0.1%)
5. Australia (No Change) 1.8% (-0.1%)
6. Ireland (No Change) 1.5% (=)
7. Poland (No Change) 1.4% (-0.1%)
8. Denmark (No Change) 1.3% (=)
9. France (+1) 1.2% (=)
10. Brazil (-1) 1.2% (=)

It has continued to be a very cosmopolitan blog this month and an honourable mention must go in particular to the 1 new country/territory that has provided its first viewers to my fledgling blog this September.

American Samoa has supplied its first reader to my blog during the past month!

Fair play to them all, and to you all, for putting up with my ramblings!

The 182nd Most Popular British Political Blogger! Thank You To My Readers

I've been away for the past week at the annual Liberal Democrat conference in Birmingham (a review to follow in a forthcoming blog post). During the week I've been away, Total Politics have been drip-feeding their 2011 Blog Awards Results out to the wider-world. It's the first time that I've been involved in the proceedings and I must add my comment to that of others that the way in which they were released did not show Total Politics off in a particularly professional light.

But anyway, the results themselves amazed me. I was really quite stunned to have made such high entries into 5 different categories at my first attempt. The various categories were broadly split into two - for individual Bloggers and for Blogs.

In general terms, I came out much higher as an individual named blogger than my blog did on its own merit. I don't really know what this means but it would seem to indicate that my presence as a Welsh, local government and Liberal Democrat individual blogger has been greater than the presence of the total worth of the blog in which I have written.

Either way, here are the results...

In the Top 50 Welsh Blogs List I came in at No.20 which is especally pleasing as I have been particularly keen over the past year to emphasise my Welsh roots in my writings.

In the Top 35 Councillor Blogs List I again came in at No.20. Again, this is particularly pleasing as I have attempted amongst my various writings, to give an insight into life as a Cardigan and Ceredigion County Councillor. On which note, hearty congratulations should also go to my Ceredigion colleague, Plaid Cymru Councillor Alun Williams who came in at No.35 on the list.

In the Top 100 Lib Dem Bloggers List I came in at No.22, right in the middle of a mix of names of Lib Dem bloggers who I greatly respect.

In the Top 100 Lib Dem Blogs List I came in at No.37, again right in the middle of a mix of Lib Dem blogs that I greatly enjoy reading.

Finally, whilst my blog didn't make the overall Top 300 UK Political Blogs List, my name as an individual Blogger more than did so.

In the Top 300 UK Political Bloggers List I finished high up at Number 182, ahead of (amongst others) Jon Snow, Daniel Finkelstein, Bethan Jenkins AM, Glyn Davies MP, Johann Hari, Simon Hoggart, Ed Miliband and possibly best of all, Nadine Dorries!

I will proudly add the buttons to my blog over the coming days to showcase these results as I am incredibly thankful to all of my readers who voted for me in the recent Total Politics Blog Awards in the Wales, Council and Liberal Democrat categories.

I dedicate my first year growth and acknowledgements to my blogging mentor Andrew Reeves who gave me such encouragement and support along the way before his untimely death back in June.

Thank you Andrew and thank you to everyone who made the effort to nominate little old me and my writings in this way.

A Year in Blogging (Part II) - The Statistics

Yesterday, I blogged here about the odd circumstances that brought me into the blogging world and I commented on some of my personal favourite blog posts along the way.

Today, it's the hardcore statistics.

Google Analytics & Flag Counter
I began blogging properly a year today, September 4th 2010. I didn't however synch up my blog to the excellent and recommended Google Analytics software (with thanks to Ali Goldsworthy for doing so!) until September 20th. So the stats I am about to unleash doesn't cover the entire year as such but for the sake of a fortnight, I'm happy for these to stand as my figures for my first year in blogging.

For information below on the nations/territories that have visited my blog however, the statistics come from Flag Counter which I added to my blog on September 13th and which therefore has an extra week's worth of statistics over Google Analytics. The numbers that both have thrown up are generally very similar so I have faith in them both, unlike the Blogger Stats from the site itself which in my mind overinflates the pageviews to the blog so I have generally avoided using it for statistical purposes.

Stat Attack
This is my 386th blog post since this day last year. As of this afternoon, according to the reliable Flag Counter and Google Analytics, over 49,000 absolute unique visitors have visited my site and those blog posts in the past 12 months. Of these, some 75.40% are new visitors and 24.60% are returning visitors. According to my Blogger Pageview counter, they has accounted for over 111,000 pageviews made in that time though I tend to believe the more reliable Google Analytics number of 65,000 pageviews.

According to Google Analytics, the bounce rate for my blog during the past year has been 72.51%.

Busiest Month
As my monthly stat reports have shown, there has been an unsurprising general trend of growth in readers to my blog as it has become more established. My busiest month, according to Google Analytics was that of May with 6,485 absolute unique visitors to my blog making 6,908 visits and viewing 9,738 pages.

My busiest month in terms of output mind was January with 42 blog posts published in that month.

Busiest Day
On May 2nd, my Osama Bin Laden's Death - Obama's Victory & Pakistan's Shame blog post clearly hit a nerve and resulted in a daily record of 992 visitors making a record 1,341 pageviews.

Top 10 Most Read Blog Posts

According to Google Analytics, the Top 10 most read blog posts during the past year in terms of pageviews have been:

1. 'The King's Speech' - The Book Vs The Film (SPOILER WARNING!) (4,951 Pageviews)
2. Rory McIlroy - A Leap of Faith to Join the Immortals of Golf (4,763 Pageviews)
3. Has Mark Webber Blown It? (2,884 Pageviews)
4. Labour's Leighton Andrews' Extraordinary Live TV Coco Pops Outburst (1,673 Pageviews)
5. Osama Bin Laden's Death - Obama's Victory & Pakistan's Shame (1,482 Pageviews)
6. My Sports Personality of the Year - Phil 'The Power' Taylor (1,050 Pageviews)
7. As the Yemenese Domino Falls, is Syria next? (842 Pageviews)
8. The Aberfan Perspective (803 Pageviews)
9. An Apology to Karen & Richard Carpenter. Yours Sincerely, A Musical Snob. (771 Pageviews)
10. Wembley Bound with Swansea City AFC (693 Pageviews)

Top 10 Traffic Sources
According to Google Analytics, the Top 10 traffic sources to my blog during the past year in terms of visits have been:

1. Google Organic (15,469 visits)
2. Direct Traffic (6,292 visits)
3. Facebook (4,769 visits)
4. Google.com (3,009 visits)
5. Google.co.uk (2,790)
6. Blogger.com (1,338 visits)
7. Lib Dem Blogs (1,335 visits)
8. Twitter (1,170 visits)
9. Lib Dem Voice (850 visits)
10. rialtocr.blogspot.com (665 visits)

According to Google Analytics, 48.10% of my traffic during the past year have come from referral sites as opposed to 37.40% from search engines and 14.50% from direct traffic.

Top 10 Keywords
According to Google Analytics, the Top 10 Keywords typed into a search engine that have brought visitors to my blog are:

1. Rory McIlroy (1,811 visits)
2. The King's Speech Book (859 visits)
3. Mark Webber (769 visits)
4. Coco Pops (397 visits)
5. Phil Taylor (309 visits)
6. Mark Cole Blog (242 visits)
7. 80th Birthday Poems (184 visits)
8. Lionel Logue (155 visits)
9. Zoe Scott Alan Partridge (148 visits)
10. John Barry (145 visits)
    

A Proudly International Blog!
When it comes to the geography of my readership, I have found Flag Counter to me a more reliable source than Google Analytics as some 276 visits have not been registered with the nation of origin whereas with Flag Counter, this number is only 187.

Therefore, according to Flag Counter, the top ten countries to date (with % of total views and total visitors) are:

1. United Kingdom (49.7%) (24,479 visitors)
2. United States (20.2%) (9,949 visitors)
3. Germany (2.4%) (1,200 visitors)
4. Canada (2.3%) (1,111 visitors)
5. Australia (1.9%) (944 visitors)
6. Ireland (1.5%) (755 visitors)
7. Poland (1.5%) (732 visitors)
8. Denmark (1.3%) (644 visitors)
9. Brazil (1.2%) (609 visitors)
10. France (1.2%) (594 visitors)

During the year, 165 nations or territories have supplied visitors to my blog! If my reckoning is correct, that still leaves another 54 nations/territories left unaccounted for - still work to be done then!

The Next 12 Months
Looking ahead, all I can do is to do what I've done over the past 12 months - to write on issues that interest me. Whether they interest my readers is another matter but for now, a heartfelt thanks to those who visited my site over the past 12 months.

If you've enjoyed reading the blog posts that I've written half as much as I've enjoyed writing them, then it can be put down to being a good partnership!

Please keep reading...

A Year in Blogging (Part I) - Why, How & My Favourite Bits

On September 4th last year, I decided to undertake a novel social experiment. I was going to go where I had never thought I'd go. Not only that, but I was going to go to a place which had in the past attracted ridicule from this very place.

Yes, I was going to enter the dark, murky world of blogging.

An Aborted Start
I had in fact made an aborted attempt back at the beginning of 2009, beginning with a blog post on the eve of President Obama's innauguration. But I only managed 7 blog posts over the next 5 weeks before it all dried up. But my Mayoral year in Cardigan from that following May to May 2010 ended up having long-term repercussions that led me to begin properly back in September last.

From Diary to Blogging
The manic Mayoral schedule which saw me complete 460 engagements in 12 months had a negative impact on my diary keeping. Having kept a diary since the beginning of 2002, any semblance of order fell apart as my Mayoral duties took complete control of my free time. As a result, over 7 years of the Cole Diaries came to an abrupt and unexpected end - the final entry being the day of my Mayor-Making in May 2009.

Although I had gently ridiculed my blogging friends in the past, I found in the summer of last year after my Mayoral year had been completed that I now had no outlet for my creative writing tendencies. Although I do not consider myself creative in the general sense, I have always had a passion for writing and whilst the diary was a more structured and in part formal means of communicating my thoughts to paper through the written word, it did nevertheless become a part of my daily routine - usually before I went to sleep.

But having now gone over a year without the diary, the thought of going back to it was not one that appealed to me. I therefore went back to my dormant blog and considered making a proper go of it this time as opposed to the false start of early 2009.

A Year in Blogging
There was no snappy welcome or introduction when I decided to jump into the blogging world properly as a diary substitute. No, instead I was spurred into action as a direct result of Wales' loss in their opening European Championship qualifier to Montenegro with this despairing rant about how Paul Bodin broke my heart back in 1993.

It was a marker for the future. Suddenly, here was an opportunity for me to write creatively about the interests and passions that have made me the person that I am. That means personal blog posts, blog posts about my work as a local Councillor in Ceredigion, blog posts about the Liberal Democrats and politics more generally, blog posts about my homeland in west Wales and blog posts on passions of mine such as sport and music.

I quickly found a rhythm with my blogging as it filled the void that had been left by the loss of my diary keeping. If there's been an urgent issue that has made its name in the news and I have happened to be on-line at the time to comment on it, I've done so there and then. But generally, if I have an opinion, I'll write about it in the evening after a day's work and before bed and will release it at a suitable point in the future. So I've usually got a back-log of a few blog posts waiting to be released as long as they are not time sensitive. I don't know if this is how other bloggers work but it has served me and my time constraints and working schedule, well.

In those formative months, Andrew Reeves was always at the end of a Facebook message, happy to help with any queries that I may have. I am indebted to him for the cheery support and encouragement that he gave to this green blogger still finding his feet in this overwhelming new world.

My Favourite Blog Posts
As I said, it was the opportunity to unleash the creative shackles of writing a formal diary to the more fluid form of blogging that has given me much pleasure over the past 12 months. In that time I have written 383 blog posts - just over one a day on average which almost corresponds directly to my old diary output.

The second part to this blog post which I'll publish tomorrow will cover the year in statistics but it's odd which blog posts prove popular and which don't. There are some that come out of nowhere to become the most widely read. Others which I've poured much love and affection into, are clearly not to the taste of the wider readership. But then, that's half the fun - not knowing which words of wisdom will fly and which will largely be left un-read.

So forgetting the data and the popularity or otherwise of what I have written, here's a small compilation of my personal favourite blog posts.

Losing a Father (Sept, 2009) - My Sympathies with David Cameron on the loss of a father, looking back at that same seminal moment in my life back in 2003.

The Pope and Me (Sept, 2009) - My views on religion as seen through the prism of Pope Benedict XVI's visit to the UK.

A Time for Lib Dem MP's to Rebel (Oct, 2009) - My take on the Tuition Fees Debacle at the outset. As I said then, "There's a time and a place for rebellion - particularly in government. This is most certainly one of them".

The Aberfan Perspective (Oct, 2009) - One of the most poigniant posts that I have written.

My Desert Island Discs Choice of 8 (in Solidarity with Nick Clegg) (Oct, 2009) - An opportunity for me to espouse the virtues of my all-time favourite pieces of music.

My Flirtation with Burma (Nov, 2009) - A personal recollection of an Asian Odyssey to the Bridge on the River Kwai brought on by the release of Aung An Suu Kyi from house arrest in Burma.

"In the name of God, do your duty" - A Tribute to Atticus Finch (Nov, 2009) - An ode to a literary, fictional hero, 50 years after the launch of 'To Kill a Mockingbird'.

Martin Bell, Ceredigion's W.I. and me (Nov, 2009) - My brush with a boyhood political idol (and Ceredigion's W.I.!).

A Homage to Christmas Number Ones (Dec, 2009) - A journey down the weird and wonderful world of some Christmas Classics (and some not so!).

I'd rather be watching the Darts down at the Lakeside... (Jan, 2010) - Realising a boyhood dream.

Jeux Sans Frontieres on S4C (1991-1994) - Wonderful Memories! (Jan, 2010) - Sentimental, childhood nostalgia.

Tesco Vs Sainsbury - Cardigan's Cuban Missile Crisis (Feb, 2010) - A supermarket war in Cardigan and my quotation of Dean Rusk in the Ceredigion County Council Planning Committee!

A Day in the (Cardigan) Life of Cllr Mark Cole (Feb, 2010) - Why I love being a Councillor.

Fianna Fail in Meltdown - Early Irish Election Results (Feb, 2010) - My fascination in Irish politics and history gave me a particular insight into a historic Irish election result.

The Deputy Prime Minister - Putting Ceredigion on the Map (April, 2010) - It isn't every day the Deputy PM comes to Ceredigion you know.

My Top 20 Greatest Sporting Commentary Moments Countdown (April, 2010) - Because I love sport and because I love iconic moments in sporting history.

My Ceredigion and Welsh Lib Dem Assembly Election Review (May, 2010) - Does exactly what it says on the tin.

An AV Referendum Battering? Good (May, 2010) - My blunt conclusion to an AV Referendum mauling.

Dyfed Celt Troops the Colour! ****Photo Special**** (June, 2010) - A proud day as our family's shire horse makes his big Horseguards Parade debut!

A Graduation of Aberystwyth Liberals (July, 2010) - Showing my appreciation to a fab gang of graduating student Liberal Democrat members.

My Weird and Wonderful Lib Dem Family (July, 2010) - Another poigniant post in the aftermath of the shock death of Andrew Reeves and the ties that bind my Liberal Democrat family together.

"Mr Gorbachev, Tear Down This Wall" - Berlin, 50 Years On (Aug, 2010) - A glowing tribute to my favourite world city on the 50th anniversary of the erection of the Berlin Wall.

Memories of my Father (Aug, 2010) - A recall of my father and his love of photography.

As it happens, that brief selection begins and concludes with personal reflections on my father. That is one of the reasons I've enjoyed this past year in blogging. It has given me an opportunity to reflect publicly on what has been a fortunate life to date and all of the myriad different people and places that have touched it.

Tomorrow as I stated above, I'll be releasing my blog stats for the year.

My Internet Stat Porn Monthly Report (12) August

This is my twelth monthly round-up of blog figures for anyone who is remotely interested in who reads my little blog. These stats for the month of August come courtesy of google analytics.

Summer Disruption
The problem this month however, is that I'm not going to give the detailed stats as I have had 'malfunctions' with the google analytics link to my blog.

It is in fairness my fault. During the month, having passed the 100,000 pageviews milestone, I decided to give my blog a make-over and therefore freshened it up with a whole new look and new local links. The problem is that I hadn't realised at the time that so doing disrupted the flow of data through to google analytics. I therefore went 3 whole days in the middle of the month with no data transfer at all until I managed, with great help from Greg Foster, to get the link up-and-running again.

I am wondering whether, now that I've gone full circle with a whole year of blogging, whether I shall give up n the monthly reports. I'll see how I feel this time next month.

So the stats here will be brief as I can not give an accurate, proper monthly report.

What I do know is that having written 32 blog posts this past month, as opposed to 30 in July and 25 in June, the viewing figures have actually been markedly lower because I've been writing more on local issues which don't attract as many 'hits'.

Although not complete because of that mid-month lapse, I am willing to give an indication as to the popularity of the most read blog posts this past month.

So the top 10 stories by direct page views that you've read this month were:

1. Rory McIlroy - A Leap of Faith to Join the Immortals of Golf
2. A Gareth Epps Sized Lib Dem Conference Farce
3. Labour's Leighton Andrews' Extraordinary Live TV Coco Pops Outburst
4. Wembley Bound with Swansea City AFC!
5. As the Yemenese Domino Falls, is Syria Next?
6. Lib Dem By-Election WIN
7. Cardigan Street Racing (featuring the 2011 Welsh National Criterium Championship)
8. In Praise of English Test Cricket...
9. 9am: Swansea City AFC - Premier League!
10. Reflections on A-Level Results Day

Of the 10, 5 were written this month - the other 5 are popular blog posts written in months past that continue to attract hits.

Whilst my Rory McIlroy - A Leap of Faith to Join the Immortals of Golf blog post remained at No.1 for the second month running, it is now on the verge of overtaking my 'The King's Speech' - The Book Vs The Film film (Spoiler Warning) blog post to become the most read post of all-time.

An International Blog!
I can at least give some concrete data on the countries that have been visiting the site.

The chart below has seen Denmark move into the Top 10 for the first time, whilst Poland has made a marked rise up the rankings. The dual reason for this is that I have seen a lot of extra traffic arrive at the site from these two countries over the past week to visit my Rory McIlroy - A Leap of Faith to Join the Immortals of Golf blog post.

The top ten countries to date are as follows (with position change from July & % of total views):

1. United Kingdom (No Change) 49.6% (+0.3%)
2. United States (No Change) 20.3% (-0.8%)
3. Germany (No Change) 2.4% (-0.2%)
4. Canada (No Change) 2.3% (=)
5. Australia (No Change) 1.9% (-0.1%)
6. Ireland (No Change) 1.5% (-0.1%)
7. Poland (+2) 1.5% (+0.4%)
8. Denmark (New Entry) 1.3%
9. Brazil (-2) 1.2% (-0.1%)
10. France (-2) 1.2% (-0.1%)

It has continued to be a very cosmopolitan blog this month and honourable mentions must go in particular to the 2 new countries/territories that have provided its first viewers to my fledgling blog this August.

Timor-Leste and Aruba have both supplied their first readers to my blog during the past month taking the cumulative total of countries/territories to have supplied visitors to this blog over the past 12 months to 165!

Fair play to them all, and to you all, for putting up with my ramblings!

Lib Dem Blog of the Year 2011 Nominations

I've been a bit slow on this one what with Bank Holidays and birthdays and Council work, but thanks to a tip-off by Spiderplant Land, I have noticed that nominations for the Lib Dem Blog of the Year Awards 2011 have opened and close this Friday, 2nd September.

A number of readers of this blog have already told me that they've nominated me in the recent Total Politics Blog Awards which is madness but a very nice, fluffy and warm kind of madness all the same.

I remember keeping Steph Ashley company at her first conference in Brighton (was it as far back as 2007?!) and she was deadly excited to attend the BOTYs - the Lib Dem Blog of the Year Awards ceremony. I can recall gently scoffing at the thought as the whole idea of blogging had passed me by. But last September in Liverpool conference, just a week or so after I started blogging seriously, I did make a tentative first appearance in the BOTY Awards ceremony to put faces to illustrious names!

Since then, as I stated here in my blog just a few weeks ago, I have greatly enjoyed blogging during these past 12 months.

The 2011 Lib Dem BOTY Award categories are:

• Best new Liberal Democrat blog (started since 1st September 2010)
• Best blog from a Liberal Democrat holding public office (The Tim Garden Award)
• Best use of blogging / social networking / e-campaigning by a Liberal Democrat
• Best posting on a Liberal Democrat blog (since 1st September 2010)
• Best non-Liberal Democrat politics blog
• Liberal Democrat Blog of the Year

Up to 3 Nominations per category can be made and they need to be e-mailed to helen@libdemvoice.org.

I've just cast my nominations for the blogs that I have enjoyed reading over the past year and for Lib Dem minded readers out there, if you haven't done so yet, I would encourage you to do so as well. The only one that I will mention by name now is that of my blogging mentor Andrew Reeves who I nominated for Blog of the Year in recognition of his blogging before his untimely death recently.

If you feel that my little addition to the blogosphere merits a nod in any of the categories above, then it would be great for you to do by nominating them to the e-mail address above.

A Blog Re-Vamp (Version #2) - Comments Welcome

As I mentioned last week, I have re-vamped my blog front page after 11 months and over 100,000 pageviews after I started blogging properly last September.

Yesterday I made the initial changes by making changes to the content. I've done so by making a push on promoting local businesses and organisations in Cardigan and also more widely throughout Ceredigion in the hope that I can give them some free publicity. I have done so so by placing prominently their web links on the front page.

Today I have re-vamped in its entirety, the design of the blog to move away fromt the standard blogger template which was beginning to grate with me. I've gone with a light blue background and a chequered flag image to signify my passion and that of my father before me, to motorsport. The new template has also got clearly defined sections which better seperate the core content to the links and buttons down the right hand-side.

I've also widened the width of the blog as I was getting increasingly frustrated at what I felt was its 'clunky' nature with some posts and their photos or video clips too large for the space afforded to the core content. That has now hopefully been rectified by this change.

Finally, following on from the masthead design used by Alex Folkes which I've always liked, I have somehow by hook or by crook managed to do the same with mine with a photo of a younger me aged 3 or 4 to remind myself that life is for the living and that for as long as we are young at heart, nothing should phase us in the challenges that lie ahead. Thank you to Alex who gave me some helpful advice on doing so.

I would be interested to hear what visitors to my blog think of the changes. Is it more user friendly and is it easy to read? All constructive views will be greatly welcomed!

In the meantime, as I stated yesterday, if there are any other businesses or organisations in Cardigan or throughout the county (or indeed Pembrokeshire and Carmarthenshire!) that would like to add their website link to my blog, then please don't hesitate to contact me and I will add them also!

Thank you for reading.

A Blog Re-Vamp (Version #1)

As I mentioned last week, I have re-vamped my blog front page after 11 months and over 100,000 pageviews after I started blogging properly last September.

I've made a push on promoting local businesses and organisations in Cardigan and also more widely throughout Ceredigion in the hope that I can give them some free publicity.

I had intended to do so as attractive and eye-catching 'buttons' but short of having the html coding for every site, I have failed to decipher how I can do so just with the website addresses so for now, they will be placed prominently on my blog front page as links. If you know how to do so as buttons, please do get in touch!

In the meantime, if there are any other businesses or organisations in Cardigan or throughout the county (or indeed Pembrokeshire and Carmarthenshire!) that would like to add their website link to my blog, then please don't hesitate to contact me and I will add them also!

Total Politics Blog Awards

I hope that Alex Folkes doesn't mind my leaning on his insight into mentioning that the Total Politics annual blog awards nominations have opened this morning.

As a new blogger on the scene over the past 12 months, I must admit that I have greatly enjoyed the opportunity to release my creative juices onto the wide world during this time. As keen readers will be aware, there are no limits to what I may write about. Be it about local issues here on the Council in Ceredigion, Welsh issues or national issues more widely, my musings as a Liberal Democrat activist or my passions for sport, music, TV and family, there is no telling what I may coment upon.

I've been mildly staggered at the amount of people that have read my blog during the past year and hope that my posts have been both intellectually stimulating and enjoyable to read.

I've just cast my votes for the blogs that I have enjoyed reading over the past year. If you haven't done so yet, I would encourage you to do so and if you feel that my little addition to the blogosphere merits a nod in the Lib Dem, Wales and/or Councillor categories, then it would be great for you to do so right here. Either way, you have to vote for at least five blogs in order of preference and voting closes at midnight on August 19th.

Get voting!

My Internet Stat Porn Monthly Report (11) July

This is my eleventh monthly round-up of blog figures for anyone who is remotely interested in who reads my little blog. These stats for the month of July come courtesy of google analytics.

Calming Down
After the busiest two months on record in May and June, July was a quieter month.

Although my output for the month of 30 blog posts signified an increase from the 25 in June, the viewing figures were significantly lower than my previous bests. In July, I had a total of 4,531 absolute unique visitors to my blog - down from the 5,844 figure in June and my May record of 6,485 but was up on the figures of 3,971 in April, 3,764 in March, 3,926 in February, 2,370 in January, 1,702 in December, 1,024 in November, 701 in October and 597 in September.

The 4,531 absolute unique visitors made 4,832 visits to my blog in July, down from the figure of 6,222 in June, and 6,908 in May but up on the figures of 4,335 in April, 4,237 in March, 4,308 in February, 2,668 in January, 2,180 in December,1,396 in November and 1,107 in October). They viewed 6,662 pages, compared to 8,787 in June, 9,738 pages in May, 6,239 in April, 6,121 in March, 6,447 in February, 4,240 in January, 3,435 in December, 1,991 in November and 1,711 pages in October.

The top 10 stories by direct page views that you've read this month were:

1. Rory McIlroy - A Leap of Faith to Join the Immortals of Golf
2. The Face of Unimanageable Horror - Anders Behring Breivik
3. Anders Behring Breivik - In His Own Words
4. Andy Murray Needs to Summon the Rory McIlroy Spirit for Sporting Immortality
5. Has Mark Webber Blown It?
6. Labour's Leighton Andrews' Extraordinary Live TV Coco Pops Outburst
7. Lembit Opik Apologises for Mick Bates Slur
8. The Ed Miliband Media Car Crash
9. 'The King's Speech' - The Book Vs The Film (SPOILER WARNING!)
10. An Oslo Tragedy

Of the 10, 5 were written this month - the other 5 are popular blog posts written in months past that continue to attract hits. The Norwegian tragedy cast its long shadow over the month as 3 of my top 10 posts were dedicated to the awful events there in recent weeks.
Whilst my Rory McIlroy - A Leap of Faith to Join the Immortals of Golf blog post remained at No.1 for the second month running (and has now become the second most read post of all-time), my Has Mark Webber Blown It? blog post remained in the top 5 for a 9th consecutive month despite having still never made the monthly top grade!

Blog Traffic
Of all of the blog visitors, 17.09% were through direct traffic (up from 15.48% in June), 44.64% came from referring sites (down from 47.07%) and 38.27% via search engines (up from 37.45%).

My top 10 referring/search engine sites for the last month were (with change from June):

1. Google (No Change)
2. Facebook (No Change)
3. Twitter  (+1)
4. Blogger.com (-1)
5. Lib Dem Blogs (+1)
6. Lib Dem Voice (+1)
7. rialtocr.blogspot.com (-2)
8. carmarthenplanning.blogspot.com (New Entry)
9. Yahoo (+1)
10. peterblack.blogspot.com (New Entry)

An International Blog!
The visitors to my little blog came from 102 countries/territories this month - down marginally from the 107 total in June and the record of 123 in May, but up on the 94 in April, 88 in March, 85 in February and 68 in January (with a cumulative total of 163 countries/territories having supplied visitors to my blog to date).

The top ten countries to date are as follows (with position change from June & % of total views):

1. United Kingdom (No Change) 49.3% (+1.4%)
2. United States (No Change) 21.1% (-1.1%)
3. Germany (No Change) 2.6% (=)
4. Canada (No Change) 2.3% (-0.1%)
5. Australia (No Change) 2.0% (-0.1%)
6. Ireland (No Change) 1.6% (-0.2%)
7. Brazil (No Change) 1.3% (-0.1%)
8. France (+1) 1.2% (+0.1%)
9. Poland  (-1) 1.1% (-0.1%)
10. Holland (No Change) 1.0% (-0.1%)

It has continued to be a very cosmopolitan blog this month and honourable mentions must go in particular to the 8 new countries/territories that have provided its first viewers to my fledgling blog this July.

St Lucia, Suriname, Uzbekistan, New Caledonia, Cape Verde, Papua New Guinea, Cameroon and Cambodia have all supplied their first readers to my blog during the past month!

Fair play to them all, and to you all, for putting up with my ramblings!

100,001 pageviews...and counting...

It's a new month and 11 months after I began blogging properly I've somehow managed to rack up over 100,000 pagviews.

Whilst the 'bounce rate' will dictate that not all of these have genuinely come and visited my blog for a sustained period of time, it is nevertheless a milestone that I felt shouldn't be left to pass without comment.

Some 43,000+ unique visitors have visited the site during this time and have accounted for this 6-figure number of pageviews.

In a few days time I'll be seeking to re-launch my front page with new buttons to provide free advertising for local businesses in Cardigan. Watch this space...

In the meantime, a huge thanks to everyone who has taken a passing or a more detailed interest in my random and eclectic musings of this, that and the other!

My Internet Stat Porn Monthly Report (10) June

This is my tenth monthly round-up of blog figures for anyone who is remotely interested in who reads my little blog. These stats for the month of June come courtesy of google analytics.

Another Busy Month
After the record shattering antics of May, June was a quieter month, albeit only slightly.

Although my output for the month of 25 blog posts was the lowest monthly total since last October, I still reached near parity with the record-breaking viewing figures from May.

It was the exploits of Rory McIlroy at the US Open that meant that I experienced on 20th June, the second ever busiest day on my blog. The Rory McIlroy - A Leap of Faith to Join the Immortals of Golf blog post which I wrote back in April shot up as a result to become the 3rd most read blog post that I've written of all-time.

Because of that one blog post in particular, the viewing figures for the month were impressive. In June I had a total of 5,844 absolute unique visitors to my blog, down only marginally from my May record of 6,485 and up on 3,971 in April, 3,764 in March, 3,926 in February, 2,370 in January, 1,702 in December, 1,024 in November, 701 in October and 597 in September.

The 5,844 visitors made 6,222 visits to my blog in June, again only marginally down on the May figure of 6,908 (compared to 4,335 in April, 4,237 in March, 4,308 in February, 2,668 in January, 2,180 in December,1,396 in November and 1,107 in October) and viewed 8,787 pages (compared to 9,738 pages in May, 6,239 in April, 6,121 in March, 6,447 in February, 4,240 in January, 3,435 in December, 1,991 in November and 1,711 pages in October).

The top 10 stories by direct page views that you've read this month were:

1. Rory McIlroy - A Leap of Faith to Join the Immortals of Golf
2. Has Mark Webber Blown It?
3. Wembley Bound with Swansea City AFC
4. 'The King's Speech' - The Book Vs The Film (SPOILER WARNING!)
5. Labour's Leighton Andrews' Extraordinary Live TV Coco Pops Outburst
6. Terry Pratchet: Choosing to Die
7. Phillip Schofield is in the Priory?
8. As the Yemenese Domino Falls, is Syria next?
9. Dear Lembit Opik, With All Due Respect, Your Opinion Doesn't Matter Here Anymore.
10. A Service in Memory of Andrew Reeves

Of the 10, 4 were written this month - the other 6 are popular blog posts written in months past that continue to attract hits. It was a rather solemn month as my popular blog posts ranged from Andrew Reeves' untimely early death and also the moving Terry Pratchet documentary on assisted dying. There were lighter moments as well however as a Phillip Schofield wheeze on Twitter caught the eye.

My Has Mark Webber Blown It? blog post remained at No.2 and thus making the top 5 for the 8th consecutive month despite having still never made the monthly top grade!

Blog Traffic
Of all of the blog visitors, 15.48% were through direct traffic (up from 14.24% in May), 47.07% came from referring sites (down from 50.16%) and 37.45% via search engines (up from 35.60%).

My top 10 referring/search engine sites for the last month were (with change from May):

1. Google (No Change)
2. Facebook (No Change)
3. Blogger.com (+1)
4. Twitter (-1)
5. rialtocr.blogspot.com (+2)
6. Lib Dem Blogs (-1)
7. Lib Dem Voice (-1)
8. aol.com (No Change)
9. liberalengland.blogspot.com (+1)
10. Yahoo (New Entry)

An International Blog!
The visitors to my little blog came from 107 countries/territories this month - down marginally from the 123 record of May, but on the 94 in April, 88 in March, 85 in February and 68 in January (with a cumulative total of 155 countries/territories having supplied visitors to my blog to date).

The top ten countries to date are as follows (with position change from May & % of total views):

1. United Kingdom (No Change) 47.9% (-0.7%)
2. United States (No Change) 22.2% (+2.6%)
3. Germany (No Change) 2.6% (-0.4%)
4. Canada (No Change) 2.5% (-0.3%)
5. Australia (No Change) 2.1% (-0.2%)
6. Ireland (No Change) 1.8% (-0.2%)
7. Brazil (+2) 1.4% (+0.2%)
8. Poland (-1) 1.2% (-0.2%)
9. France (+1) 1.1% (+0.1%)
10. Holland (-2) 1.1% (-0.1%)

It has continued to be a very cosmopolitan blog this month and honourable mentions must go in particular to the 6 new countries/territories that have provided its first viewers to my fledgling blog this June.

Greenland, the British Virgin Islands, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Mozambique, Bolivia and Laos have all supplied their first readers to my blog during the past month!

Fair play to them all, and to you all, for putting up with my ramblings!

My Blogging Mentor - RIP Andrew Reeves

I was on the train on my way to Swansea on Friday morning when I heard the news via Facebook. At first, I thought that I'd got my wires crossed and that there must be two Andrew Reeves because the truth of the situation was so incredulous that it surely couldn't be true.

My Blogging Mentor -
Andrew Reeves

But unfortunately, it is and his position within the party was such that it merited this BBC News article on this sad news. To die aged just 43 of a heart attack and just months after his civil partnership with Roger is just heartbreaking.

Like Anders Hanson said of Andrew in his blog, it would usually only be at Liberal Democrat conferences that I would see him and though I didn't know him that well, he was nevertheless someone who I looked up to in the party.

The outpouring of grief on social media sites such as Twitter and Facebook demonstrates just how popular and well liked Andrew was. Through his many years of work for the party in England to his life in his current role as Director of Campaigns for the Scottish Liberal Democrats, he engendered loyalty from those who knew him.

Andrew Reeves Running Blog
My particular connection with Andrew was via this very thing that I'm doing now - blogging.

For years I poured gentle ridicule on bloggers but I must admit that since I fully embraced the medium back in September. I have enjoyed it greatly.

Throughout that time, there are certain bloggers and blogs that I have followed more than others. One of those was Andrew Reeves' Running Blog. It always mixed well his interest in politics with all of his other life passions. What I particularly liked was how he had so fully embraced his adopted city's Ice Hockey team. I'm a Cardiff Devils fan on the quiet and despite the fact that the Edinburgh Capitals languished at the bottom of the Elite League, Andrew still supported them avidly and would report back their progress to us on his blog.

The fact that there was clearly more to him than just the politics endeared me to him. In my blogging, I have also tried to demonstrate my many and various passions in a readable and user-friendly way in the same manner as Andrew successively did.

As well as enjoying Andrew's blog and his style of writing, he was also of much support to me when I began blogging properly back in September. For a relative newbie to blogging, I had many technical questions that needed answering and I knew that I could always send Andrew a message on Facebook and he would helpfully reply and encourage my progress. He was all to happy to offer support and it was greatly appreciated. I also copied some of the trademarks that he had on his blog. For example, his was the only blog that I have seen which had a 'Map Counter' on the front page, showing readers how many people have visited the site from different countries from around the world. As a geographic geek on the side, I thought this was brilliant and on asking him where I had to go to download this application, he told me and the same counter now sits on my blog.

So Andrew was a great help to me and in many regards, he was my blogging mentor. I would visit his blog on most days and everything he said always came across in a balanced, reasoned, belieavable and passionate manner.

Everyone who knew him knows that we are all at a loss without him. His sudden death is a great shock to us all and I personally, still can't quite believe and comprehend it. Looking back on his blog, it was less than 48 hours before he was cruely taken away from us that he was blogging about the E-Coli outbreak in Europe and the need to ban the import of cucumbers from Spain as a result.

Now, he's gone and his blog will not be updated from that final entry. It is just mind-bogingly difficult to think that someone with such a zest for life, could be taken away from us so suddenly and without warning.

To show my appreciation to Andrew, I have changed the header to my blog in his memory. His encouragement played a large part in my decision to blog seriously and the example he set with his is one that I have endeavoured to follow and will continue to do so in the future. This gesture will remind me of his support for as long as I continue to blog.

Rest in peace Andrew and thank you for being such a kind and genuine human being.

My Internet Stat Porn Monthly Report (9) May

This is my ninth monthly round of blog figures for anyone who is remotely interested in who reads my little blog. These stats for the month of May come courtesy of google analytics.

A Record Shattering Month
Thanks to one blog post, May saw all of my previous blog records shattered into pieces. On 2nd May, I wrote the blog post Osama Bin Laden's Death - Obama's Victory & Pakistan's Shame. Suddenly out of nowhere, it became the busiest day ever on my blog with near on 1,000 hits to my site on that day alone and within its 2 day lifespan, it became the 3rd most read blog post that I've ever written.

My total output of 38 blog posts for the month was my highest since the 40 in February and below my all-time high of 42 in January.

But because of the one blog post in particular, the viewing figures smashed all of my records to date. In May, I had a total of 6,485 absolute unique visitors to my blog - smashing my previous best total of 3,971 in April, and up on 3,764 in March, 3,926 in February, 2,370 in January, 1,702 in December, 1,024 in November, 701 in October and 597 in September. The 6,485 visitors made 6,908 visits to my blog in May (compared to the 4,335 in April, 4,237 in March, 4,308 in February, 2,668 in January, 2,180 in December,1,396 in November and 1,107 in October) and viewed 9,738 pages (compared to 6,239 in April, 6,121 in March, 6,447 in February, 4,240 in January, 3,435 in December, 1,991 in November and 1,711 pages in October).

The top 10 stories by direct page views that you've read this month were:

1. Osama Bin Laden's Death - Obama's Victory & Pakistan's Shame
2. Has Mark Webber Blown It?
3. 'The King's Speech' - The Book Vs The Film (SPOILER WARNING!)
4. A Footballer, Imogen Thomas and a Superinjunction
5. Labour's Leighton Andrews' Extraordinary Live TV Coco Pops Outburst
6. My Ceredigion and Welsh Lib Dem Assembly Election Review
7. The Master of Political Cartoon Satire - The Independent's Dave Brown
8. Goodbye No.4 Cowley St - Will the last person to leave please turn out the lights.
9. The Aberfan Perspective
10. As the Yemenese Domino Falls, is Syria next?

Of the 10, 5 were written this month - the other 5 are popular blog posts written in months past that continue to attract hits.

The overnight success of my Osama Bin Laden's Death - Obama's Victory & Pakistan's Shame blog post pushed my 'The King's Speech' - The Book Vs The Film (SPOILER WARNING!) blog post off the top spot after 4 consecutive months as it slumped to 3rd. Has Mark Webber Blown It? remained at No.2 and thus making the top 5 for the 7th consecutive month despite having still never made the top grade!

My Goodbye No.4 Cowley St - Will the last person to leave please turn out the lights. blog post was helped by coming top of the Liberal Democrat Voice Golden Dozen of most read blog posts from that site last week.

Of all of the blog visitors, 14.24% were through direct traffic (up from 12.18% in April), 50.16% came from referring sites (up from 43.21%) and 35.60% via search engines (down from 44.61%).

My top 10 referring/search engine sites for the last month were (with change from April):

1. Google (No Change)
2. Facebook (No Change)
3. Twitter (+2)
4. Blogger.com (-1)
5. Lib Dem Blogs (+1)
6. Lib Dem Voice (+1)
7. rialtocr.blogspot.com (-3)
8. aol.com (+2)
9. Ask (-1)
10. liberalengland.blogspot.com (New Entry)

An International Blog!
The visitors to my little blog came from a whopping 123 countries/territories this month - up from 94 in April, 88 in March, 85 in February and 68 in January (with a cumulative total of 149 countries/territories having supplied visitors to my blog to date).

The top ten countries to date are as follows (with position change from April & % of total views):

1. United Kingdom (No Change) 48.6% (-1.6%)
2. United States (No Change) 19.6% (+3.4%)
3. Germany (No Change) 3.0% (-0.3%)
4. Canada (No Change) 2.8% (-0.4%)
5. Australia (+1) 2.3% (-0.1%)
6. Ireland(-1) 2.0% (-0.4%)
7. Poland (No Change) 1.4% (=)
8. Holland (+2) 1.2% (-0.1%)
9. Brazil (-1) 1.2% (-0.1%)
10. France (New Entry) 1.0%

It has continued to be a very cosmopolitan blog this month but primarily because of my Osama Bin Laden's Death - Obama's Victory & Pakistan's Shame blog post, it reached many more new countries that it had never reached previously - a staggering 20 new countries in May alone.

Honourable mentions must therefore go to those 20 new countries/territories that have provided its first viewers to my fledgling blog this May. Somalia, Rwanda, Fiji, Guam, Netherlands Antilles, Madagascar, Bhutan, Ivory Coast, Cayman Islands, Reunion, Seychelles, Marshall Islands, Tanzania, Paraguay, Monaco, Oman, Falkland Islands, Afghanistan, Togo and Sudan have all supplied their first readers to my blog during the past month!

Fair play to them all, and to you all, for putting up with my ramblings!

My Internet Stat Porn Monthly Report (8) April

This is my eighth monthly round of blog figures for anyone who is remotely interested in who reads my little blog. These stats for the month of April come courtesy of google analytics.

Despite a slight reduction in blogging this month, April has nevertheless been by most read month to date.

Having blogged a record 42 times in January and 40 times in February, I was down to just over one a day in March with 33 posts. Now in April, I blogged 30 times and yet, my stats were the best yet.

Despite the slight drop in blog posts, the viewing figures have broken a number of my records to date. In April, I had a total of 3,971 absolute unique visitors to my blog - up on the total of 3,764 in March, beating my previous best of 3,926 in February, and substantially up from 2,370 in January, 1,702 in December, 1,024 in November, 701 in October and 597 in September. The 3,971 visitors made 4,335 visits to my blog in April (compared to the 4,237 in March, my previous record of 4,308 in February, 2,668 in January, 2,180 in December,1,396 in November and 1,107 in October) and viewed 6,239 pages (compared to 6,121 pages in March, a still record of 6,447 in February, 4,240 in January, 3,435 in December, 1,991 in November and 1,711 pages in October).

The top 10 stories by direct page views that you've read this month were:

1. 'The King's Speech' - The Book Vs The Film (SPOILER WARNING!)
2. Has Mark Webber Blown It?
3. Will Kate and William Pay for My Wedding?
4. The Aberfan Perspective
5. Labour's Leighton Andrews' Extraordinary Live TV Coco Pops Outburst
6. The Deputy Prime Minister - Putting Ceredigion on the Map
7. A Thought-Provoking 80th Birthday Poem
8. Apology to Karen and Richard Carpenter
9. Alan Partridge's Mid Morning Matters on North Norfolk Digital Radio! (episode 11)
10. My Sport Personality of the Year - Phil 'The Power' Taylor

A typical mix of politics, sport, entertainment, music and the movies then.

Of the 10, only 1 was written this month - the other 9 are popular blog posts written in months past that continue to attract hits.

Against my expectations, My 'The King's Speech' - The Book Vs The Film (SPOILER WARNING!) blog post has topped the monthly poll for a 4th consecutive month. My Has Mark Webber Blown It? post continues to go strong (every time there's a Grand Prix predictably!) going back up to No.2 and making the top 5 for the 6th consecutive month despite having never made the top grade.

Meanwhile, my Will Kate and William Pay for My Wedding? blog post of last November shot in at No.3 due in large part to to the Royal Wedding last week. My The Aberfan Perspective post also continues to go from a renewed strength to strength despite being written last October and was my 4th most read post in April. Most incredibly, in at No.7 was my A Thought-Provoking 80th Birthday Poem which has come from nowhere to make my Top 10 despite having been written on September 10th!

The only blog post written this month to make the grade was of Nick Clegg's visit to Ceredigion on the campaign trail in The Deputy Prime Minister - Putting Ceredigion on the Map.

Of all of the blog visitors, 12.18% were through direct traffic (down from 13.76% in March), 43.21% came from referring sites (down from 51.05%) and 44.61% via search engines (up from 35.19%).

My top 10 referring/search engine sites for the last month were (with change from March):

1. Google (No Change)
2. Facebook (No Change)
3. Blogger.com (No Change)
4. rialtocr.blogspot.com (No Change)
5. Twitter (No Change)
6. Lib Dem Blogs (No Change)
7. Lib Dem Voice (No Change)
8. Ask (New Entry)
9. Yahoo (-1)
10. aol.com (New Entry)

An International Blog!
The visitors to my little blog came from 94 countries/territories this month - up from 88 in March, 85 in February and 68 in January (with a cumulative total of 129 countries/territories having supplied visitors to my blog to date).

The top ten countries to date are as follows (with position change from March & % of total views):

1. United Kingdom (No Change) 50.2% (+0.6%)
2. United States (No Change) 16.2% (+0.8%)
3. Germany (+1) 3.3% (-0.2%)
4. Canada  (-1) 3.2% (-0.5%)
5. Ireland (No Change) 2.4% (-0.4%)
6. Australia (No Change) 2.4% (-0.2%)
7. Poland (+1) 1.4% (+0.4%)
8. Brazil (+2) 1.3% (+0.1%)
9. Thailand (-2) 1.3% (-0.3%)
10. Holland (-1) 1.3% (=)

It has continued to be a very cosmopolitan blog.

Honourable mentions must also go to those 9 new countries/territories that have provided its first viewers to my fledgling blog this April. Lybia, Iran, El Salvador, Barbados, China, the Aland Islands, Guadeloupe, Senegal and Bermuda have all supplied their first readers to my blog during the past month!

Fair play to them all, and to you all, for putting up with my ramblings!

My Internet Stat Porn Monthly Report (7) March

This is my seventh monthly round of blog figures for anyone who is remotely interested in who reads my little blog. These stats for the month of March come courtesy of google analytics.

At last, my blog has finally calmed down after a frenetic first 6 months of blogging. After a month-on-month continued growth, March saw the first overall fall back on the month before. It was nevertheless only a mild fall back and it was still an active month on the blog. Having blogged a record 42 times in January and 40 times in February, I was down to just over one a day in March with 33 posts.

So, here come the stats...

But despite a larger drop in blog posts, the viewing figures have remained only slightly lower than my February best. In March, I had a total of 3,764 absolute unique visitors to my blog - down marginally on the 3,926 in February but up from my previous records of 2,370 in January, 1,702 in December, 1,024 in November, 701 in October and 597 in September. The 3,764 visitors made 4,237 visits to my blog (compared to the 4,308 in February, 2,668 in January, 2,180 in December,1,396 in November and 1,107 in October) and viewed 6,121 pages (compared to 6,447 in February, 4,240 in January, 3,435 in December, 1,991 in November and 1,711 pages in October).

The top 10 stories by direct page views that you've read this month were:

1. 'The King's Speech' - The Book Vs The Film (SPOILER WARNING!)
2. Alan Partridge's Mid Morning Matters on North Norfolk Digital Radio! (episode 11)
3. It is with great regret that I must resign
4. Has Mark Webber Blown It?
5. Wales Can Do Better - A Welsh Liberal Democrat Conference Review
6. A Musical Tribute to John Barry OBE (1933-2011)
7. Labour's Leighton Andrews' Extraordinary Live TV Coco Pops Outburst
8. The Aberfan Perspective
9. Comic Relief (1988-2011) - My Best Musical Bits
10. The Pressure of Politics

A typical mix of politics, sport, entertainment, music and the movies then.

My 'The King's Speech' - The Book Vs The Film (SPOILER WARNING!) blog post has topped the monthly poll for a 3rd consecutive month but its readership has slowed in recent weeks so I doubt it'll make it 4 months in a row at the top. My Has Mark Webber Blown It? post is still going having made the top 5 of my most read blog posts for a 5th consecutive month despite having never made the top grade. My 'My Sports Personality of the Year - Phil 'The Power' Taylor' post however has fallen outside of the top 10 down at No.11 for the first time since it entered in December. These three are by a country mile my most read blog posts to date. These 'slow-burning' blog posts have really helped my blog stats to keep ticking over nicely. Meanwhile, Labour's Leighton Andrews' Extraordinary Live TV Coco Pops Outburst remains in the top 10 having been No.3 last month. Oddly, my The Aberfan Perspective blog post made a re-entry at No.8 having been my 5th most read blog post back in October!

I was pleasantly surprised to find a blog post of mine taking a Liberal Democrat Voice 'Top of the Blogs: Golden Dozen' accoldade for the third time. This is where the top blog posts read via the libdemblogs aggregator are accumulated in one place each week. This time, the post that made it was my It is with great regret that I must resign post and it made the No.1 spot that week! It was admittedly written with that specific title in mind to pull in the hits - and it clearly worked!

Of all of the blog visitors, 13.76% were through direct traffic (down from 15.71% in February), 51.05% came from referring sites (down from 53.51%) and 35.19% via search engines (up from 30.78%).

My top 10 referring/search engine sites for the last month were (with change from January):

1. Google (No Change)
2. Facebook (No Change)
3. Blogger.com (+1)
4. rialtocr.blogspot.com (+3)
5. Twitter (No Change)
6. Lib Dem Blogs (-3)
7. Lib Dem Voice (-1)
8. Yahoo (+2)
9. wood4thetrees.wordpress.com (New Entry)
10. Iaindale.blogspot (New Entry)

An International Blog!
The visitors to my little blog came from 88 countries this month - up from 85 countries in February and 68 in January (with a cumulative total of 120 countries having supplied visitors to my blog to date).

The top ten countries to date are as follows (with position change from February & % of total views):

1. United Kingdom (No Change) 49.6% (-2.8%)
2. United States (No Change) 15.4% (+0.7%)
3. Canada (No Change) 3.7% (=)
4. Germany (+1) 3.5% (+0.6%)
5. Ireland (-1) 2.8% (-0.5%)
6. Australia (No Change) 2.6% (+0.4%)
7. Thailand (No Change) 1.6% (-0.4%)
8. Poland (No Change) 1.4% (=)
9. Holland (No Change) 1.3% (=)
10. Brazil (No Change) 1.2% (No Change)

The % of viewers to my blog from the UK has continued to fall and has slipped underneath the 50% mark for the first time having been as high as 80% after my first full month last September. It has continued to be a very cosmopolitan blog.

Honourable mentions must also go to those 8 new countries that have provided its first viewers to my fledgling blog this March. Syria, Armenia, Kuwait, Panama, Zambia, Jordan, Niger and Mongolia have all supplied their first readers to my blog during the past month!

Fair play to them all, and to you all, for putting up with my ramblings!

My Internet Stat Porn Monthly Report (6) February

This is my sixth monthly round of blog figures for anyone who is remotely interested in who reads my little blog. These stats for the month of February come courtesy of google analytics.

Yet Another Record Breaking Month
After yet another record breaking month in January, I expected things to cool down somewhat in February. But to the contrary, my blog continues to go from strength to strength. I kept to the same level of output in February with 40 blog posts, only marginally down on the 42 in January.

So, here come the stats...

But despite a slight drop in blog posts, the viewing figures compared to previous months has gone through the roof. In February, I had total of 3,926 absolute unique visitors to my blog - up from my previous record of 2,370 in January, 1,702 in December, 1,024 in November, 701 in October and 597 in September. The 3,926 visitors made 4,308 visits to by blog (up from 2,668 in January, 2,180 in December,1,396 in November and 1,107 in October) and viewed 6,447 pages (up from 4,240  in January, 3,435 in December, 1,991 in November and 1,711 pages in October). So the number of 'hits' to my blog maintains its upward curve from month to month.

The top 10 stories by direct page views that you've read this month were:

1. 'The King's Speech' - The Book Vs The Film (SPOILER WARNING!)
2. My Irish Election Predictions (aka History in the Making)
3. Labour's Leighton Andrews' Extraordinary Live TV Coco Pops Outburst
4. My Sports Personality of the Year - Phil 'The Power' Taylor
5. Has Mark Webber Blown It?
6. BBC Wales Rugby Adverts at their best - Wales Vs England? Bring It On!
7. An Apology to Karen & Richard Carpenter. Yours Sincerely, A Musical Snob.
8. A Musical Tribute to John Barry OBE (1933-2011)
9. The Cardiff Underground!
10. Tesco Vs Sainsbury – Cardigan’s Cuban Missile Crisis

A typical mix of politics, sport, music and the movies then.

In fact, my 'The King's Speech' - The Book Vs The Film (SPOILER WARNING!) blog post has continued where it left off in January and with the film's ascent to its Oscars triumph, has become my most read blog post of all time with over 1,800 unique pageviews - more than double it's nearest contender, Has Mark Webber Blown It? It and the My Sports Personality of the Year - Phil 'The Power' Taylor posts have continued to gather more viewers despite having been written in October and December respectively. These three are by a country miles my most read blog posts to date. These 'slow-burning' blog posts have really helped my blog stats to keep ticking over nicely.

I was pleasantly surprised to find a blog post of mine taking a Liberal Democrat Voice 'Top of the Blogs: Golden Dozen' accoldade for the second time. This is where the top blog posts read via the libdemblogs aggregator are accumulated in one place each week. This time, the post that made it was my Labour's Leighton Andrews' Extraordinary Live TV Coco Pops Outburst post which helped make February 21st the all-time busiest day on my blog yet.

Of all of the blog visitors, 15.71% were through direct traffic (up from 15.37%  in January), 53.51% came from referring sites (down from 62.26% ) and 30.78% via search engines (up from 22.26%).

My top 10 referring/search engine sites for the last month were (with change from January):

1. Google (No Change)
2. Facebook (No Change)
3. Lib Dem Blogs (No Change)
4. Blogger. com (+1)
5. Twitter (+1)
6. Lib Dem Voice (-2)
7. rialtocr.blogspot.com (New Entry)
8. stereophonics.com (New Entry)
9. Peterblack.blogpost (No Change)
10. Yahoo (No Change)

In at No.7 is an enthusiastic Brazilian follower who has added my site to his blog-roll and in at No.8 was the Stereophonics website which contained a link to my BBC Wales Rugby Adverts at their best - Wales Vs England? Bring It On! blog post!

An International Blog!
The visitors to my little blog came from 85 countries this month - up from 68 in January (with a cumulative total of 112 countries having supplied visitors to my blog to date).

The top ten countries to date are as follows (with position change from January & % of total views):

1. United Kingdom (No Change) 52.4% (-8.9%)
2. United States (No Change) 14.7% (+3.3%)
3. Canada (+1) 3.7% (+1.7%)
4. Ireland (+3) 3.3% (+1.3%)
5. Germany (-2) 2.9% (-0.3%)
6. Australia (No Change) 2.2% (+0.2%)
7. Thailand (-2) 2.0% (-0.9%)
8. Poland (+1) 1.4% (+0.4%)
9. Holland (-1) 1.3% (+0.2%)
10. Brazil (New Entry) 1.0%

The % of viewers to my blog from the UK has continued to fall from the 80% that it registered after my first full month last September down now to a little over 50%. It has become a very cosmopolitan blog with an increasing record 14% + coming from the USA. Interestingly, my readership from South America has increased quite noticeably in recent weeks and I account for this particularly through my Brazilian 'fan'!

Honourable mentions must also go to those 19 new countries that have provided its first viewers to my fledgling blog this February. Macedonia, Venezuela, Sri Lanka, Georgia, Ecuador, Bahrain, Costa Rica, Zimbabwe, Macao, the Palestinian Territory, Honduras, Dominica, Algeria, Bahamas, Jamaica, Guatemala, Guyana, Mauritius and Iraq have all supplied their first readers to my blog during the past month!

Fair play to them all, and to you all, for putting up with my ramblings!

My Internet Stat Porn Monthly Report (5)

This is my fifth monthly round of blog figures for anyone who is remotely interested in who reads my little blog. These stats for the month of January come courstesy of google analytics.

Another Record Breaking Month
After the record breaking month of December, I expected things to cool down somewhat in January. But to the contrary, I wrote a record 42 blog posts this month, up from the then record of 38 in December.

So, here come the stats...

In January, I had a record 2,370 absolute unique visitors to my blog - up from the 1,702  record of December, 1,024 in November, 701  in October and 597 in September. The 2,370 visitors visited the blog on 2,668 occasions (up from 2,180 in December,1,396 in November and 1,107 in October) and viewed 4,240 pages (up from 3,435 in December, 1,991 in November and 1,711 pages in October). So the number of 'hits' to my blog continues from month to month.

The top 10 stories by direct page views that you've read this month were:

1. 'The King's Speech' - The Book Vs The Film (SPOILER WARNING!)
2. My Sports Personality of the Year - Phil 'The Power' Taylor
3. Has Mark Webber Blown It?
4. Lib Dem defection to Labour akin to jumping onboard the Titanic
5. An Anfield Farce - Liverpool FC in Turmoil
6. Why I'm not accepting Ed Miliband's offer of joining the Labour Party
7. The Sydney Morning Herald verdict - Australia's Worst XI
8. Liberty Vs Security - Lib Dems get Detention without Charge Progress
9. Minimum Alcohol Pricing - Good or Bad?
10. The reports of the Lib Dem death are greatly exaggerated

A typical mix of politics, sport, and the movies then.

In fact, my 'The King's Speech' - The Book Vs The Film (SPOILER WARNING!) blog post has been read more rapidly in recent days than it had when I first wrote it. It is now already the second most read blog post that I have written. It lies behind my Has Mark Webber Blown It? post, which although written on October 31st, continues to pull in pageviews on a constant basis and was my 3rd most read post this month. My Sports Personality of the Year - Phil 'The Power' Taylor post has moved up from 8th in December to be my No.2 in January and is my 4th most read blog post of all time. These 'slow-burning' blog posts have really helped my blog stats to keep ticking over nicely.

Of all of the blog visitors, 15.37% were through direct traffic (up from 13.58% in December), 62.26% came from referring sites (up from 53.81% ) and 22.26% via search engines (down from 32.61%).

My top 10 referring/search engine sites for the last month were (with change from December):
1. Google (No Change)
2. Facebook (No Change)
3. Lib Dem Blogs (No Change)
4. Lib Dem Voice (No Change)
5. Blogger. com (No Change)
6. Twitter (No Change)
7. Iaindale.blogspot.com (New Entry)
8. Mobile Facebook (-1)
9. Peterblack.blogpost (New Entry)
10. Yahoo (New Entry)

A surprise this month was being included in one of the 'Daley Dozen' top blog posts on Iain Dale's blog. It helped to bring in some extra new readers to read my Liberty Vs Security - Lib Dems get Detention without Charge Progress post.

An International Blog!
The visitors to my little blog came from 68 countries this month - up from 61 in December (with a cumulative total of 93 countries having supplied visitors to my blog to date).

The top ten countries to date are as follows (with position change from December & % of total views):
1. United Kingdom (No Change) 61.3%
2. United States (No Change) 11.4%
3. Germany (+3) 3.2%
4. Canada (+1) 2.9%
5. Thailand (-2) 2.9%
6. Australia (+1) 2.0%
7. Ireland (-3) 2.0%
8. Holland (+1) 1.1%
9. Poland (+1) 1.0%
10. New Zealand (-2) 0.8%

The % of viewers to my blog from the UK has fallen from 80% after my first full month last September down to a little over 60%. It has become a very cosmopolitan blog with a now record 11% + coming from the USA (The King's Speech' popularity in the Oscars stakes has helped that in recent weeks). My Sports Personality of the Year - Phil 'The Power' Taylor blog post has also for example drawn in many readers from Holland and Germany.

Honourable mentions must also go to those countries that have provided its first viewers to my fledgling blog this January. Montenegro, Belarus, Bangladesh, Chile, Peru, Maldives, Nigeria and Colombia have all supplied their first readers to my blog during the past month.

Fair play to them all, and to you all, for putting up with my ramblings!

My Internet Stat Porn Monthly Report (4)

This is my fourth monthly round of blog figures for anyone who is remotely interested in who reads my little blog. These stats for the month of December come courstesy of google analytics.

A Record Breaking Month
After a busy first few months, I expected to settle down into a calmer pace of blogging this month. As it turns out, it's been my busiest yet. I wrote 38 blog posts this month, double the 19 I wrote in November. It beats my previous high of 30 in September. The bulk of these were from my 'enthusiasm' for the Coronation St 50th anniversary week which elicited much from my keyboard.

So, here come the stats...

In December, I had a record 1,702 absolute unique visitors to my blog - up from the 1,024 record of November, 701 in October and 597 in September. The 1,702 visitors visited the blog on 2,180 occasions (up from 1,396 in November and 1,107 in October) and viewed 3,435 pages (up from 1,991 in November and 1,711 pages in October). So the result of my record busy month of typing has been an unsurprising record busy month of blog visitors.

The busiest day of the month on my blog was Monday 6th December, when I wrote a spoiler blog post in readiness for the carnage that was about to hit Coronation St. Indeed, that blog post was the most read of the 38 that I wrote in December.

The top 10 stories by direct page views that you've read this month were:

1. Coronation St Tram Crash Spoiler
2. Has Mark Webber Blown It?
3. Killer Corries Quotes (No.1) - Ena Sharples
4. We Lib Dems may dislike the Tories, but Labour can *add expletive* right off
5. Wiliams Vs Higgins - Two Snooker Greats
6. Elizabeth Evans - A Fresh Start for Ceredigion
7. Working with the Plaid Cymru Enemy
8. My Sports Personality of Year - Phil Taylor
9. Women lead the Liberal Way in Ceredigion
10. A Homage to Christmas Number Ones

In fact, though that particular Coronation St Tram Crash Spoiler blog post topped my monthly charts, it actually lies second behind my original Has Mark Webber Blown It? blog post in my list of all-time read blog posts.

The bemusing interest in my Has Mark Webber Blown It? post which I mentioned back in my last monthly update, continues! After the initial interest died down a couple of days after it was published on October 31st, as is usually the case with blog posts, I suddenly found it being read in increasing numbers from November 14th - the day he lost out of the World Championship in the final race. Ever since then, the post has been read by a varying number of readers on a daily basis and continues to do so. A real 'slow burner' of a blog post if ever there was one but it has now risen as I've stated to have become the most read blog post that I've written.

Of all of the blog visitors, 13.58% were through direct traffic (down from 15.04% in November), 53.81% came from referring sites (down from 61.10%) and 32.61% via search engines (up from 23.85%).
My top 10 referring/search engine sites for the last month were (with change from November):

1. Google (No Change)
2. Facebook (No Change)
3. Lib Dem Blogs (No Change)
4. Lib Dem Voice (No Change)
5. Blogger. com (No Change)
6. Twitter (No Change)
7. Mobile Facebook (+1)
8. Queenmembers.com (-1)
9. Spoilernews.com (New Entry)
10. Freedom Central (-1)

The visitors to my little blog came from 61 countries this month - up marginally from 60 in November (with a cumulative total of 84 countries having supplied visitors to my blog to date).

The top ten countries for December were as follows (with position change from November & % of total views):

1. United Kingdom (No Change) 73.7%
2. Thailand (New Enry) 3.9%
3. Ireland (+3) 1.9%
4. United States (-2) 9.0%
5. Canada (New Entry) (+2) 1.5%
6. Germany (-1) 0.9%
7. Australia (-3) 0.6%
8. New Zealand (New Entry) 0.5%
9. Poland (New Entry)  0.5%
10. Brazil (New Entry) 0.5%

My Mark Webber post has out of nowhere, illicited a real interest in of all places, Thailand! It supplied the most amount of visitors to my blog of any country behing the UK in December and now stands in 3rd overall, also behind the USA. My Coronation St posts also helped to significantly increase the viewship from Ireland and a mention must also go to New Zealand which has also gone up significantly this past month.

Honourable mentions must also go to those countries that have provided its first viewers to my fledgling blog this December. Martinique, Moldova, Denmark, Puerto Rico, Gibraltar, Dominican Republic, Malta and Luxembourg have all supplied their first readers to my blog during December.

Fair play to them all, and to you all, for putting up with my ramblings!