Those of us who have been writing on HubPages experienced major drops in traffic when Google changed its algorithms in a way that resulted in a site-wide "slap". The change in algorithms has become known as "Panda" across the Internet, and anyone familiar the Internet-world-shaking changes knows that the rolling out of "Panda" has been quite the big deal on a lot of sites. HubPages was one of those sites.
In the HubPages community the word of the hour, word of the day, and word of the year was "Panda". That it is until, in response to Panda, talk of giving each contributor (Hubber) his own subdomain within HubPages began. After that that, the word of the hour, day, and year seemed to change from "Panda" to "subdomains"; and an epic-drama within another epic-drama began to both spin off from, but also remain part of, the overall one.
From the subdomain epic-drama spun off a roller-coaster ride of traffic increases and drops between different Hubbers, but also at times for the same contributor. Essentially, a lot of upheaval and uncertainy has gone on for a lot of Hubbers (more for some than others) - and thus has been the state-of-affairs for a lot of HubPages writers for six months now.
The original Panda storm was something that affected the whole site; but I suspect once subdomains were introduced, eliminating that particular aspect of the upheaval, a lot of members may have resumed (as they say) "regular programming" and business as usual (well, maybe not quite "as usual"). Without re-hashing the details of all the events, a certain amount of upheaval seemed to settled down after the introduction of subdomains. On the other hand, and as evidenced by the many discussions on HubPages' forums, a lot of people didn't resume business as usual. Some resumed business, but not "as usual", because many seemed to be spending a lot of time on the forums, trying to figure out what was happening with everyone else in the community and with the site in general. I was among that latter group.
I hate to make the following comparison, but when Panda first showed up I was glued to the screen in much the same way I'd been when 911 took place. The difference (besides the obvious one involving the fact that Internet doings are far from similar to 911) was that with 911 it had been the television screen (and radio). (Again, please forgive the poor comparison.) In any case, with Panda it was the computer screen, but it was also news being sent to me via e.mail by relatives who aren't involved with Internet writing but know I am. There was even a phone call or two aimed at telling me what my non-Internet-writing relatives had heard, or read, in the news. In the HubPages community, links to one interview or another were showing up from one direction or another.
For me, such intent focus on this Internet-wide event died down to some extent after the first day, but only some. In the days to follow my own degree of "paying attention" and trying to figure out what I should be doing next remained fairly high. I'd go to the forums to see what was happening, get involved in reading (or participating in) threads that usually amounted to a lot of collective wheel-spinning, as well as my own, individual and private, weighing of what appeared to be happening to what, and whom. So it was pretty draining.
Just as some of the intensity and newness of it all had seemed to die down a little, HubPages introduced subdomains in July. That's when the epic Panda drama stepped to the side (a little, anyway) and made room for the companion epic-drama, "Subdomains". The subdomains drama has been a long-running one on the HubPages community now, but even it has become slightly less the main focus with some recent, dramatic, traffic increases and drops that have been taking place as a result of the very subdomains that were spun off from the Panda drama.
Subdomains almost (ALMOST) seemed to have settled in when the traffic changes suddenly hit. That was, I believe, about a week ago (although I've often been so engrossed in the minute-to-minute goings on that I may have lost a little track of which Thursday night it was that the traffic climbs began to scare some people. In any case, things improved for a lot of people but not all. Then, too, some of the people who saw those dramatic traffic increases later saw dramatic drops in it. The word, "roller coaster", shows up often in community discussions. The whole thing has been interesting, to say the least. The collective efforts to try to improve the situation, as well as the collective attempts to try to figure out who may have done what wrong, has both united and divided the community at one time or another.
As a writer, there are things I've seen happening that I do think are encouraging. It's not al bleak and upheaval. Still, there's no denying the upheaval that continues to exist. A good number of people (I'm one) think it will take quite a bit more time before things really settle (if they ever do; nobody's sure they will). In the meantime, it hasn't helped that my offline projects have been slow toward the end of Summer, because I've had all the time in the world to "just check" the forums, which really means often being drawn like a moth to a flame to one of the subdomains or traffic threads, only to take a temporary break (never far away from the draining threads, and usually without leaving the forums) before heading back to one of those wheel-spinning threads again.
My usual (non-late-Summer) "system" is to leave up HubPages forums in a separate window and pop on and off from time to time whenever I want to take a break from working. Since Panda, each time I've started to drift away from the regular and intense focus of the latest goings-on, some new thing would happen and re-ignite the interest, fascination, and attempt to become both amateur detective and "larger/smaller picture specialist".
The only thing that has assured me that I haven't become a complete forum addict is that I know I wouldn't have had the time to spend so much of the last month or so engaged in the collective wheel-spinning on the forums if I'd had more work to do offline. I was pretty much in the process of phasing away from the high-intensity interest when the traffic roller-coaster began a week or so ago. As it looks to me now, a lot of people are still enjoying high traffic, but many have been tosssed to depths when it comes to traffic. There are, of course, some who say nothing much has changed with them over the last six months. The name for people who enjoyed the dramatic increase in traffic, only to have dramatic drops, has become known as "plungers". Recently, even plungers have again enjoyed increases; so there's at least the possibility that with a little more time some of those plungers will see things improve. As it is now, I've got my own fingers crossed but am prepared to start diving at any time.
It's nice to see things improving for yet more people. Still, I've just had to decide that I'm going to stop paying attention to any of it for now. I've had nothing much else to do in recent weeks (projects slow; so I had the luxury of paying attention to the roller coaster), but it's Labor Day weekend; and next week things get busy again. Things look good enough for me for now, and if I get "sandboxed" (or anything like that) - well, whatever.. I've just gotten to where I think (at least with me) there has to be some cut-off point for paying daily attention. If traffic starts to slip it gets ominous seeming. It it's at an all time high there's the tension of waiting to see if it starts to slip (or take a giant dive, not that that's happened to me yet recently). If somebody else's traffic takes a dive I start thinking mine is next.
I'm not suggesting anyone else do this (at all), but I think I'm going to call this the "cut-off point" and close the book on the epic drama that has been the Panda/subdomain thing; at least unless/until some new, big, dramatic thing happens. Whatever goes on, goes on. Hopefully, what goes on will be reasonably OK. If it isn't I'll do the next thing. It's time (for me anyway) to concentrate on either spiffing up existing Hubs or writing new ones and stop checking my traffic every "ten minutes" and trying to keep up with what's going on site-wide (and Google-wise) as far as traffic goes. It can just get too mentally draining after the first six months or so of such intent paying-attention. :lol: I switched to my subdomain around the first week of July and started paying attention to all the talk about how having subdomains would be "the worst thing in the world".
Wishing everyone with traffic increases luck in keeping them, and everyone with drastic drops luck in turning them around. Happy Labor Day (to U.S. Hubbers). I can feel my "brain energy" rushing back as I write (well, at least as much as I would have otherwise had without the "paying attention", especially since the subdomain switch.
Early Spring Blooms Third Week of March
L. Warren, 2012
About Lisa's Collection
Lisa's Collection is a spare-time endeavor that's aimed at organizing my other spare-time endeavors.
I do quite a bit of online writing, and after building up a collection of material for quite awhile, I realized it was time to organize it a little better than I’d being doing.
So, I decided to start Lisa's Collection. Because I write on a variety of subjects, however, I realized that my writing really wouldn’t be sufficiently organized through the use of one blog. For that reason, I decided to make this site a “Hub” site, from which material on individual subjects can be found at the links provided. This site is my “miscellaneous department”, because most efforts to organize a wide variety of things require a “miscellaneous department” for whatever it is one is attempting to organize.
My original plan for this site was to let it be a foundation for later, more blog-like, activity; and in the meantime, post writing and whatever I thought might add a little something. When it comes to spare time, however, one can’t always count on having enough of it.
As a result, in spite of how long this blog has been in existence, it still remains fairly embryonic. It is, as they say, what it is.
(With the exception of "Life on Key", blog links may be temporarily disabled.)
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Not long ago I was reading advice about naming blogs. The individual, who clearly knows what he's doing when it comes to blogs, mentioned that people shouldn't give their blogs an "ego title" (which includes the person's name, rather than a less personal, more-to-point-about-the-theme, title). Of course, this advice was directed at anyone who hopes to earn money with his blog.
I cringed a little, though, because some of my blogs have "ego" titles. The thing is, though, it was not my ego at the root of my choice for some of the "Lisa" blogs I have.
When I started putting together blogs as way of finding a home for a lot of the writing I'd already done (with the plans of further developing them later), I wasn't particularly thinking of earning money from them. I was thinking of finding some way to organize my writing in what I hoped was an attractive "environment" that gave me the freedom to later add whatever I wanted to add.
Names like, "No Senior Coffee" and "Storm Clouds and Wind Chimes" just kind of came naturally. Then, though, I had some writing that only loosely fit into "categories", and I realized I had to come up with some cohesive name for each of those "categories". I was thinking almost in terms of names for file folders when I created the names, although, because blogs have a public nature, I thought I'd try to add something "catchy" to titles that were essentially "file folder titles".
So, along with the titles mentioned above, and along with "Dabblings in Verse", I have a whole lot of "Lisa" titles - "Lisa's Collection", "Lisa Light", "Lisa's Christmas Card", and on and on and on. I knew when I created the titles they wouldn't particularly be searched for by the public. My aim, though, wasn't really to have people search for them (in view of the fact that I wasn't try to make money with them). The plan was to direct readers to the blogs from other writing sites where my name is associated with my writing. In other words, all I wanted to do was categorize and make available my writing. I wasn't looking to become a famous Internet "presence" with it.
When I saw someone refer to personal-name titles as "ego titles" I did cringe because it occurred to me that anyone who sees some of my blogs may assume it was ego at the root of some of the titles. It wasn't, and I don't want anyone thinking it was. The "Lisa line" of titles is only a matter of "file-folder" thinking, as well as my disregard for whether or not anyone finds the sites without being directed to them by me.
I know that addressing this can come across as "defensive" of me, and that nobody really cares how or why I came up with any particular title. It isn't intended to. It's just that I'm "so-at-the- opposite-end-of-egotistical" it does kind of bother me to think that anyone - even a stranger - would believe it was ego at the root of some of the titles.
I cringed a little, though, because some of my blogs have "ego" titles. The thing is, though, it was not my ego at the root of my choice for some of the "Lisa" blogs I have.
When I started putting together blogs as way of finding a home for a lot of the writing I'd already done (with the plans of further developing them later), I wasn't particularly thinking of earning money from them. I was thinking of finding some way to organize my writing in what I hoped was an attractive "environment" that gave me the freedom to later add whatever I wanted to add.
Names like, "No Senior Coffee" and "Storm Clouds and Wind Chimes" just kind of came naturally. Then, though, I had some writing that only loosely fit into "categories", and I realized I had to come up with some cohesive name for each of those "categories". I was thinking almost in terms of names for file folders when I created the names, although, because blogs have a public nature, I thought I'd try to add something "catchy" to titles that were essentially "file folder titles".
So, along with the titles mentioned above, and along with "Dabblings in Verse", I have a whole lot of "Lisa" titles - "Lisa's Collection", "Lisa Light", "Lisa's Christmas Card", and on and on and on. I knew when I created the titles they wouldn't particularly be searched for by the public. My aim, though, wasn't really to have people search for them (in view of the fact that I wasn't try to make money with them). The plan was to direct readers to the blogs from other writing sites where my name is associated with my writing. In other words, all I wanted to do was categorize and make available my writing. I wasn't looking to become a famous Internet "presence" with it.
When I saw someone refer to personal-name titles as "ego titles" I did cringe because it occurred to me that anyone who sees some of my blogs may assume it was ego at the root of some of the titles. It wasn't, and I don't want anyone thinking it was. The "Lisa line" of titles is only a matter of "file-folder" thinking, as well as my disregard for whether or not anyone finds the sites without being directed to them by me.
I know that addressing this can come across as "defensive" of me, and that nobody really cares how or why I came up with any particular title. It isn't intended to. It's just that I'm "so-at-the- opposite-end-of-egotistical" it does kind of bother me to think that anyone - even a stranger - would believe it was ego at the root of some of the titles.
There's More to Organizing Than Just Organizing
When I first started writing on "what-you-want-to-write" sites it was a matter of "anything goes" as far as most writing sites were concerned. At the time, I hadn't been able to find full-time work because of the economy, where I live (which is "The Sticks"), family responsibilities, and my not having had a full-time job for quite awhile. I had no choice but take whatever projects anyone (who knew someone who knew someone else) would give me. I wasn't just working hard, but working hard to find yet more work. I was sick-to-death of writing stuff about things in which I had zero interest (and pretending to be interested). (Shh. Don't tell any of those people for whom I've done work that I really haven't had genuine interest in the stuff I've written for them.)
Don't get me wrong. I enjoy writing, and I even enjoy writing for other people. It's just that, as most writers will tell you, after awhile it isn't enough. So, it was a few years ago now that I began writing on writing sites. I enjoy writing on a few sites, and what I post on any of them depends on the kind of site it is.
The trouble is (without going into any specific details), ever since I've been enjoying writing online in my spare time (and picking up a fairly decent extra income at the same time), I've always kind of felt a little "off key" because, as much as I enjoy writing on writing sites; I haven't been writing the kind of material that's really what I want to write. People who spend much time on writing sites usually know that there's often debate (arguments) between those who write for money and those who write for love, or for art. My feeling off key has nothing to do with that particular (and ever famous) debate, because in a lot of ways I fit in with both sides of that particular writing coin. It more has to do with my own setting limitations on the kind of material I'll write on any site.
For example, I won't post anything I really care about on the Internet because I know too well how often some kinds of articles are stolen. I'm used to it. I do what I can about it. Still, I'm not about to post some pieces of writing in what amounts to an "up-for-grabs" venue. Then, too, there are things I'm just not going to write about. For the most part, I don't want write about objects. My wish to keep some personal business private means I'm not going to put on the Internet some things that I'd really like to write. The list of what I don't want to write goes on and on. So does the list of what I won't put on the Internet. As a result, I've found some kind of safe, middle-ground, of writing; and then I've adjusted whatever falls under the category to be as close to acceptable as it has to be on any given writing site. That's fine. I enjoy writing online, and I'll probably continue to use online writing as one of my spare-time endeavors. Still, the fact is, for several years now I've been trying to figure out what it is that has made me always feel kind of off-key when it comes to a lot of my online writing.
So often, when people are talking about how writers want readers for their work. I've always wondered if there's something wrong with me, because I plain, old, don't care if my work is ever read. Oddly, however, when I write I do write with the reader in mind; and all through the writing process, I'm imagining how a reader may react to the words I so carefully try to make click into place.
Also, there have been times when writing discussions have been about how writers want to keep getting feedback on their work, often in order to continue to edit and improve it. My thing has always been that I see each piece of writing almost as a kind of child of mine: I do my best to get it to maturity; and I send it out into the world, where it will inevitably sink or swim. Thinking of this brings to my mind the last scene in the animated version of E.B. White's Charlotte's Web, in which all Charlotte's spider eggs have turned into baby spiders that scurry away from the web she wove. (I know that making reference to "sink or swim" and spider eggs is mixing metaphors. Sorry. Sometimes I break some rules.)
In any case, over several years I've sent a very large number of "spider babies" out into the world; but as the real-life mother of grown sons and a daughter, I've learned that we remain parents no matter how old our babies are, whether or not they remain in the nest, or how far they roam from it. I don't know... As I've been trying to figure out what it is, exactly, that has been making me feel quite so off-key, it has occurred to me that no matter who, or what, we see as our "children", no mother just tosses them out into the world when they still need her and says, "Sink or swim, babies!" So why is it I've been so cavalier about tossing my own creations out into the Internet world and pretty much not been interested in ever seeing them again? I guess it's because, while they're mine, a whole lot of them are certainly not "Me" (at least not in terms of "Me, as a professional writer").
On the one hand, my spare-time "creations" are, most definitely, very much "Me, the person". The trouble is that "Me, the writer" judges my own (often more casual) writing through the eyes of someone who tends to think that only the most "professionally written" pieces of writing have a right to exist. The trouble is also, however, that "Me, the person" has a lot of things to say (for one reason or another. Not only that, but "Me, the person" just plain enjoys writing what "she" feels like writing. Sometimes the old "being of two minds" is easier than other times. Well, maybe it isn't so much "being of two minds" that's a challenge. Maybe the problem is more related to having one activity (writing) in which both of those minds are involved.
Sometimes, when I meet one of my better pieces of writing "on the street" I think, "Hey. This isn't so bad. Maybe I should like it more than I do." Sometimes, too, when I go out looking for any pieces of writing that I've never really liked, I'll realize that it never stood a chance because I didn't give it the time or chance that I gave some of its siblings. And so, I suppose, one reason I've for so long felt off-key is that I know I've sent so many of my creations out into the world without caring what happened to them. Oh, I have my writing and my projects that I very much care about. It's just that the stuff I put online is not that. The funny thing is, though, that we can think we don't care about our creations much until one day, we look out into "the streets" and realize that we are looking at something that is far more a part of us than we'd realized. I suppose, too, one problem has been that while I'll never really feel very much a part of the Internet "streets", I've been aiming to make my creations street-savvy because I've known I have no intention of becoming a part of their world.
I have my plans for how I'll approach any spare-time writing I do from here on out. In the meantime, though, I've decided to build a home for all my wayward creations, call them home, and do for them what I should have done in the first place.
Those of us who have been on writing sites recently know that these days duplicate content is being frowned on more and more. By setting up a home for my wayward creations I'll be turning them into duplicate content (if they haven't already been). I can't worry about who, out there in "Internet-Land" likes it, though; because my creations have, for too long, been fending for themselves. They need to come home now. They need me to start caring about them.
For now, their home will be on the blog, "Life On Key". I'm going to move them later.
Don't get me wrong. I enjoy writing, and I even enjoy writing for other people. It's just that, as most writers will tell you, after awhile it isn't enough. So, it was a few years ago now that I began writing on writing sites. I enjoy writing on a few sites, and what I post on any of them depends on the kind of site it is.
The trouble is (without going into any specific details), ever since I've been enjoying writing online in my spare time (and picking up a fairly decent extra income at the same time), I've always kind of felt a little "off key" because, as much as I enjoy writing on writing sites; I haven't been writing the kind of material that's really what I want to write. People who spend much time on writing sites usually know that there's often debate (arguments) between those who write for money and those who write for love, or for art. My feeling off key has nothing to do with that particular (and ever famous) debate, because in a lot of ways I fit in with both sides of that particular writing coin. It more has to do with my own setting limitations on the kind of material I'll write on any site.
For example, I won't post anything I really care about on the Internet because I know too well how often some kinds of articles are stolen. I'm used to it. I do what I can about it. Still, I'm not about to post some pieces of writing in what amounts to an "up-for-grabs" venue. Then, too, there are things I'm just not going to write about. For the most part, I don't want write about objects. My wish to keep some personal business private means I'm not going to put on the Internet some things that I'd really like to write. The list of what I don't want to write goes on and on. So does the list of what I won't put on the Internet. As a result, I've found some kind of safe, middle-ground, of writing; and then I've adjusted whatever falls under the category to be as close to acceptable as it has to be on any given writing site. That's fine. I enjoy writing online, and I'll probably continue to use online writing as one of my spare-time endeavors. Still, the fact is, for several years now I've been trying to figure out what it is that has made me always feel kind of off-key when it comes to a lot of my online writing.
So often, when people are talking about how writers want readers for their work. I've always wondered if there's something wrong with me, because I plain, old, don't care if my work is ever read. Oddly, however, when I write I do write with the reader in mind; and all through the writing process, I'm imagining how a reader may react to the words I so carefully try to make click into place.
Also, there have been times when writing discussions have been about how writers want to keep getting feedback on their work, often in order to continue to edit and improve it. My thing has always been that I see each piece of writing almost as a kind of child of mine: I do my best to get it to maturity; and I send it out into the world, where it will inevitably sink or swim. Thinking of this brings to my mind the last scene in the animated version of E.B. White's Charlotte's Web, in which all Charlotte's spider eggs have turned into baby spiders that scurry away from the web she wove. (I know that making reference to "sink or swim" and spider eggs is mixing metaphors. Sorry. Sometimes I break some rules.)
In any case, over several years I've sent a very large number of "spider babies" out into the world; but as the real-life mother of grown sons and a daughter, I've learned that we remain parents no matter how old our babies are, whether or not they remain in the nest, or how far they roam from it. I don't know... As I've been trying to figure out what it is, exactly, that has been making me feel quite so off-key, it has occurred to me that no matter who, or what, we see as our "children", no mother just tosses them out into the world when they still need her and says, "Sink or swim, babies!" So why is it I've been so cavalier about tossing my own creations out into the Internet world and pretty much not been interested in ever seeing them again? I guess it's because, while they're mine, a whole lot of them are certainly not "Me" (at least not in terms of "Me, as a professional writer").
On the one hand, my spare-time "creations" are, most definitely, very much "Me, the person". The trouble is that "Me, the writer" judges my own (often more casual) writing through the eyes of someone who tends to think that only the most "professionally written" pieces of writing have a right to exist. The trouble is also, however, that "Me, the person" has a lot of things to say (for one reason or another. Not only that, but "Me, the person" just plain enjoys writing what "she" feels like writing. Sometimes the old "being of two minds" is easier than other times. Well, maybe it isn't so much "being of two minds" that's a challenge. Maybe the problem is more related to having one activity (writing) in which both of those minds are involved.
Sometimes, when I meet one of my better pieces of writing "on the street" I think, "Hey. This isn't so bad. Maybe I should like it more than I do." Sometimes, too, when I go out looking for any pieces of writing that I've never really liked, I'll realize that it never stood a chance because I didn't give it the time or chance that I gave some of its siblings. And so, I suppose, one reason I've for so long felt off-key is that I know I've sent so many of my creations out into the world without caring what happened to them. Oh, I have my writing and my projects that I very much care about. It's just that the stuff I put online is not that. The funny thing is, though, that we can think we don't care about our creations much until one day, we look out into "the streets" and realize that we are looking at something that is far more a part of us than we'd realized. I suppose, too, one problem has been that while I'll never really feel very much a part of the Internet "streets", I've been aiming to make my creations street-savvy because I've known I have no intention of becoming a part of their world.
I have my plans for how I'll approach any spare-time writing I do from here on out. In the meantime, though, I've decided to build a home for all my wayward creations, call them home, and do for them what I should have done in the first place.
Those of us who have been on writing sites recently know that these days duplicate content is being frowned on more and more. By setting up a home for my wayward creations I'll be turning them into duplicate content (if they haven't already been). I can't worry about who, out there in "Internet-Land" likes it, though; because my creations have, for too long, been fending for themselves. They need to come home now. They need me to start caring about them.
For now, their home will be on the blog, "Life On Key". I'm going to move them later.
When you start posting animated cats on the blog that's supposed to be for organizing your spare-time writing, it's kind of obvious you've been putting in a little too much work into what was supposed to be a spare-time thing.
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