Report of 2014

WordPress users would do well to laugh themselves sick as they gorge themselves on the feast of stats tools provided by their blogging platform.  Here in the land of Blogger, there is the choice of a pen, paper and calculator or obtaining the PhD required of understanding Google Analytics.

So I'm not able to present a flashy Annual Report as my WordPress buddies are, however 2014 has been my blog's most successful year by far - gaining over 28,500 hits - so I thought a little celebration post listing the year's ten most popular posts was in order.

Here they are, in ascending order:

#10 Ticking off the To-Dos (March)

My March update on my New Year intentions.  I've no idea why this was so popular.  Behind it by just one view was my article in October, Is Sex in Second Life Pornography? which was much more interesting.

#9 Farewell Dave (May)

My farewell and eulogy to one of the most influential men in my life.

#8 Paraffin Winter (May)

My review of Peter Chowney's incredibly immersive novel.

#7 Could an office in Second Life 2 be the killer app that virtual reality is looking for? (July)

When we think of VR going mainstream, we imagine wondering around and interacting with each other in amazing photo-realistic environments.  All well and good, but a virtual office might also have much to promote it.  I seriously desire the set-up I describe here.

#6 Inventory: Your own personal ticking time bomb (June)

A discussion on how we own absolutely nothing in our SL inventories and how one day it will all be gone.  Interestingly, this issue became suddenly thrown into focus on the announcement (later that month) of a Linden successor to SL, since this news also served the purpose of highlighting to residents that SL will one day shut down.

#5 The second life of Second Life (February)

My thoughts on how the Oculus Rift will give SL a temporary second life, once it launches commercially.

#4 AFK, Indefinitely (2014) by Huckleberry Hax (February)

I published the third novel in the 'AFK' series in February.  The fourth is on its way.

#3 Linden Lab announce a successor to Second Life (June)

My thoughts on the Second Life news story of the year drew well over a thousand viewers.

#2 Twelve Pet Shop Boys songs expressed as charts, diagrams, etc (May)

I created this post whilst off work with a kidney stone and it provided a small amount of relief from the complete agony I was going through at the time.  It also proved to be a bit of a hit with the fine bunch of people who are Pet Shop Boys fans.

#1 Second Life 2 going alpha (January)

My most popular post of the year is, to be honest, a bit of a red herring.  I wrote this brief snippet to report on Philip Rosedale's 'High Fidelity' going into its alpha stage; at the time, the announcement by Linden of a successor to Second Life was months away and I chose the title because it sounded snappy.  Since Linden's announcement, however, it's drawn a high number of hits, presumably from search engine queries.  Move along.  Nothing to see here.

I'm glad to say that my #1 post doesn't account by itself for the success of the year (it would still be by far my blog's most successful year without that post).  It's also gratifying that many of the posts which didn't make it into the top ten still got a respectable number of hits compared to averages from previous years.

I'd like to thank all my readers for finding something of interest within these pages.  I'll continue to develop the blog in 2015 - its ninth year - and hope I'll see some of you make return visits during that time.  It looks set to be an exciting year potentially for virtual worlds and virtual reality.  Let's see what it brings.