Stats

Quantifying is fun, isn’t it? I was looking over my statistics for views on this blog recently and noticed that apparently there have been 292 views of Tiny Teddy, one of my posts. There have also been 173 views of The Corals – Dreaming of You. I can understand the second one, seeing as how if someone searched for the song or the lyrics, they would accidentally stumble upon it. I’m much more confused by the other one. I’m really not so sure why it is that it’s so popular. Just curious, I suppose. Most of the rest have roughly 13 or so views apiece. So I have to assume that most of my viewers have only looked through each entry the one time and thereafter check only when there’s a new one. So why the spike on these two? We may never know…

Meta Musings

Sometimes I think it’d just be good to write without a purpose before I being setting words down upon the screen. The medium of writing seems to have changed without the language discussing it keeping up. Writing is still referred to as setting words down, although now it’s the pressing of buttons creating a digital fingerprint that is realized as pixels on a screen. Somehow, after I’m done writing, er, typing, the text will still be stored in a completely nonvisual fashion. Even when no one is actively viewing a representation of the data I’m currently creating, it still exists. So, what I’m creating doesn’t exist in terms of a visual realization, it exists seperately from the standard conceptions of the written word. Given the topic of my writing this evening I doubt that the finished work itself would be the same if I were crafting it using pen and paper.

Also, is it important that the parchment I scribble upon, metaphorically, of course, is so completely removed from the original version of the exercise? Similarly do other conditioning elements factor importantly into the invention of the paragraphs? I’m prone to think that inevitably will the surrounding environment affect the inspiration. However, seeing as how nothing exists within a vacuum, it isn’t notable enough to be overly focused upon. Sorry post-modernism. I think, instead, that it’s important to view the work seperately from the author. If the author is to be the focus of examination, then the work may be a lens through which to view him, as I am a dude after all, but the contrasting statement is not as lucid. If I wish to view the work, it is not necessary to know the author. If this were so, then any and all anonymous works would be worthless. The artwork itself has independent value from the artist.

But, if we look at the works completely in a vacuum, completely abandoning all our understanding of the unique personality of the writer and the singular circumstances surrounding the creative process, then we are robbing ourselves of valuable data that could be used to enrich the understanding of the work. So it seems that the work does have its own inherent value, but that the value can be supplemented by an understanding of the origins of that work. Thus, the identity of the author is a purely additive understanding, but without that understanding, nothing is lost. Instead the extra value is not gained. The absence before presence is different than absence after presence. This leads me to theories regarding death, but I doubt many people feel like reading that after what they’ve already managed to endure. So, instead, I’ll leave the entry at its current length. Just long enough to be interesting without being of such length as to overstay its welcome. Yes, I’ve given my blog entry consciousness and it now possesses the ability to annoy you the same way an overly exuberant house guest is able to. Simply glorious.