Post Count Whores

Well apparently I haven't written anything worth replying to in my last 4 posts. Which, means that either, people don't like poetry, never see my site, or are too speechless by how moved they are by my words that they're unable to convey their thoughts on my comment boards. More than likely though, it's really just a result of my man Unfairman not being logged on recently.

It is true though that many on Joeuser are post count whores. Topics are prostituted for the highest amount of replies possible. I guess that really doesn't matter to me anyway since I never intented to claw my way to the top 10 bloggers on joeuser. It just goes to show that perhaps we need other guages of what makes a good blog. I could easily sell out with my 2 1/2 cents about abortion, Martha Stewart, The Passion of Christ, or whatever....but really, I don't read people's blogs to discuss the news. I thought we were supposed to be getting personal glimpses into peoples lives that they are able to share with us. Isn't that what this is supposed to be about?

Okay rant asside, here's my ish.

I had the great luxury of being incredibly sleep deprived yesterday as a result of an unexpected guest that's been on the mind a lot recently. I won't exploit the details of my great luck in fear that it may hinder future chances of it happening, but let's just say it awoke many senses in me that have been slumbering for a long time....in such a way that getting a hour or two of sleep was very refreshing.

I was invited to a gathering in the burbs to see one of my friends who is leaving for New Mexico in two weeks. These two weeks, I will likely be confronted with "you gotta hang out with me, I leave in two weeks. You gotta hang out with me, I leave in 13 days," etc. etc.. And that's cool because he's one of my boys and someone I'd love to devote my time to.....just stop guilting people...ha ha. So because his party, or whatever classification it might fall under, was held by his older brother as well, I again experienced a very cliquey evening where only the crew from my high school class hung out together and vice-a-versa. So I dipped out pretty early and stayed at ma and pas house instead of driving all the way back to my apartment.

Now all this life needs is to go out to breakfast, but some groceries (in that order, because buying groceries when you're hungry is dangerous) and figure out how to get that unexpected guest to be an expected guest in the future.

Peace,
Suspeckted

5,572 views 25 replies
Reply #1 Top
"Post Count Whores" Now you are getting it. You'll be a post count whore in no time with catchy titles like this.
Reply #2 Top
I would've commented but for some reason I haven't been able to post any comments for the past three days :/
Reply #3 Top
Yeah you're right, people get a bit competitive around here. Take me for instance, I'm hovering around the 50 mark at the minute so the points I get for posting this will help out :)
Reply #4 Top
I say I don't give a rat's ass about points or whatever...but then I catch myself looking to see what ranking I am.

You're not alone, hardly anyone's commented on my stuff either, and imajinit was bitching about the same thing last week.

The fact that some of us were in the same boat as Mack and had difficulty posting anything for a few days doesn't help much either.

Blog on!
Reply #5 Top
imajinit was bitching about the same thing last week
End of quote


thanks Dharma... I luv you too... :p

hey suspekt... that was a good post... i was diggin' it... hope the unexpected guest makes another appearance... things have been kinda slow as of late.. lots of people (not just me) have noticed it... i think maybe we just went thru a spell were people were writing more than they were reading or something... i dunno...

I think I'm gonna limit myself to one new article every couple days for a while, and start focusing more on reading my fellow bloggers' stuff... ;)

take care out there in blogland ya'll... i'm goin' skydivin' in a couple hours
Reply #6 Top
Post Count Whores as a title rocks. I happen to agree with you, that unless you post audience-intended articles, the chances of getting more than a couple of handfuls of responses are pretty slim. I've been looking at your poetry and find it hard to comment... I find that it needs time to germinate in my head for a while... I don't want to pass off a high-five off the top of my head without really considering what your words have done. The thing regarding titles is true though... most of my responses that I've gotten all follow posts with interesting and imaginative titles. Go figure.
Reply #7 Top
I use 'bitching' as a term of endearment, MJ....you know I love you!
Reply #9 Top
I was just about to log off and get ready for work when I saw the title "Post Count Whores". I knew that it had to be my good friend SuspeckTed, and I couldn't leave a brotha hangin. So I read the stuff, and it's true. Umm...that is all.

Ted, if your unexpected guest has an unexpected sister, let me know.
Reply #10 Top
Wahkonta Anathema - Hmm, alright, I'll keep working on my headlines...it is headlines that sell after all right?

majinit - I feel ya, sometimes I get on a kick where I try to force out a bunch of stuff, but often a lot is crap I suppose...I think I may actually have to delete some of these poems....seriously, not good.

Nicky - Well hey, I appreciate you reading, regardless of whether you have comments to share or not.

Jeremy - I'm down man, I shall be signing up as soon as I'm done with this comment (which, since I have dial-up will be in an hour or so)

Unfairman - the only thing unfair about you is how much love you reserve for me...sometimes it's too much. And I think she does have a sister, also, I think she's your date to the wedding.....but let's keep that on the DL.


TO ALL - Thanks for upping my count guys, I never knew so many people would actually show up to my pity party.
Reply #11 Top
Topics which are universally interesting will be well read.

Circlecirclecircle
Reply #12 Top
it seems that a lot of us have been having pity parties lately...

boo hoo on us...

Reply #13 Top
Poet - but is what makes them universally interesting worth discussing anyway, or are we just compelled to look at threads about, say, Janet Jackson. I couldn't care less if she died tomorrow, yet I'm sure if she did a post discussing it would be a top article/forum topic. Now do people click on it because they really think it's interesting, or because they feel compelled to have an opinion about something so incredibly irrelevant to their lives.
Reply #14 Top
I wouldn't expect people's taste in blogs to be any different from their taste in anything else. I'm sorry, I like poetry, I really do; i have a copy of Thomas Hardy's poems on my desk right now, but...

Ever watch the best seller list? Not a lot of poetry there. Lots of fiction, mind you, but fiction and the internet is still "iffy". People follow it, but it doesn't seem to latch on like a book. What else is in the best seller list? Hillary, O'Reilly, etc. When you watch TV, it is either fiction or the rehashing of current events. Well, with the small exception of reality tv, but I think that smacks people in the same spot that fiction does anyway. The only thing that shines the fiction fan here are Wahkonta and E.Macy's conspiracies...

So, what is really odd about what is popular here? Seems normal to me. Do you really think we of the Satanic top ten write about stuff we aren't interested in because we want to sit at the cool table, or do you think we are interested in the same stuff mnost other people are? Granted, some people might be "Post Count Whores", but even so, if people weren't interested they wouldn't get any attention, would they?

Do what you like. I'm sorry that people don't read your poetry. I'll read some after I post this. If you are a poet, though, you already know by now your role in society. You are in the small shelf near the back, by the New Age section. Does it suck? Damn right it sucks, no one reads my poetry at DevArt either. Do I expect them to? Nah, I am way too jaded. People come here to nod or vehemently disagree.
Reply #15 Top
BakerStreet, you're absolutely right. I don't expect a lot of people to enjoy reading my poetry and be overwhelmed with all the things they want to say about it. I just panicked a bit when I felt like I had put in a lot of effort to see what people thought about a variety of things and such and no one commented for a few days...maybe I was just getting lonely.

And I think I mentioned in another thread, if not this one, that I know poetry is one of the worst selling literature formats in existence. I, in fact, am just as guilty of perpetuating that as I find poetry quite difficult to read, but enjoy hearing it spoken. It's like reading lyrics to a song, they're not as meaningful without the author using their voice to emphasize particular words or how the words themselves are used.

I know that tabloid topics will continue to be a large draw from people simply because everyone feels they can contribute at least something to the discussion. However, whether they really care about them I think still may be up for discussion.
Reply #16 Top
*nods*

*doesn't vehemently disagree*
Reply #17 Top
as I find poetry quite difficult to read, but enjoy hearing it spoken.


There's the real crime, I think. I remember when my poor high school lit teacher tried to make us appreciate "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock". It was a bad day for all of us. Later, though, I had the benefit of hearing a recording of T.S. Eliot reading it aloud, and it was the most amazing thing I had ever heard. I think you can download it from Salon.com, actually.

I dunno if it is punctuation or a lack of imagination, but I don't think most poetry was really even meant to be read. There are poets who have a knack of thinking that way, but a lot of really good stuff gets lost in translation, I think.

P.S. My picks are "The Statue", "When I Wake Up Ugly", and "Girls In Stocking Hats".
Reply #18 Top
Ditto. I can't read Poe's, "The Bells" without doing so out loud. One cannot appreciate the work without emoting with it orally.

Don't worry about reads. It's as the 'controlled-media', and who reads that but dupes? Ayn Rand once said, In the arts, "...in large part success is proof of mediocrity". This is true and is so because of the maxim that: "The masses are asses". What a lemming follows is not my path at all.

With this site having thousands now - I came in when it was in the 2,000 range - the use of the top ten is only for political purposes of the owners. They use it to get information of their genre to outside clickers, who are un-versed and think that number 2 must be one of, "the best". It is becoming superfluous to the rest of us. The self-appointed kings and queens who tell us they are the 'best' because 150 people replied to their Janet Jackson post, are seen for what they are more and more.

I told another blogger the other day that blogger number 1,782 is as wise as the rest of us and the opinions are as valid. I used to care and got as high as number 2 until the owners began making changes to rules and routinely adding points to their own favored sites. Believe me, you can't get above 3 here and it's for a political reason that is going to be clear real soon - as pro-incumbency election laws banning dissent, opinion, and 'advertising' kick in.

So don't worry about points at all unless you want to get political opinion known in the coming months. For the rest of us, we like quality works; we could care less about those 'lung warts' on Janet Jackson. Personally, I haven't posted much at all lately, so I can get out of the top ten and just be a blogger in the crowd again. Blog ON.
Reply #19 Top
I dunno if it is punctuation or a lack of imagination, but I don't think most poetry was really even meant to be read. There are poets who have a knack of thinking that way, but a lot of really good stuff gets lost in translation, I think.


I enjoy poetry that is designed to be visually creative as well. I haven't seen too much of that here, and have half-assedly tried to post one, but the margin seemed to be set to left, and I just couldn't be bothered to figure out how to redo it. (Lazy, I know.)

I think I would be lousy at reading my own poetry aloud... I'd probably be too embarrassed to.
Reply #20 Top
Nicky, I found open mic experiences to be one of the most enlighten things ever. They really gave me a chance to witness how my emotions can be conveyed to other people. I found it terrifying and therapeutic at the same time.

It is fun to mess around with margins and stuff like that. I remember as a kid Shel Silverstein rocked at word placement and other such spacial tricks.
Reply #21 Top
Well nothing worse than replying to your own thread. But I've discovered that commenting on JoeUser really ebbs and flows...somedays have an abundance while others are sparse. If the rest of you were experiencing the hazy damp post-St. Patty's Day that MN is I bet there would be a lot more people putting in their leisure cpu hours....hence me being on here for the third time today with a likely 4th and 5th before the day is out.
Reply #22 Top
Poetry gives me a headache. Trying to figure out what they mean by different metaphors is annoying.

Here's my best poetry:

I'm not a poet
And, hell yeah,
I know it.
Reply #23 Top
Wow, beating an eight month dead horse. Nice. It may be worth noting that all but these last three comments predate your arrival at this site by over two months. Not quite the same landscape.
Reply #24 Top
I knew of Ted's writing before this he wrote this article, but I never was a 'follower' until then. An article like this does it's job... draws attention to a blog that may be overlooked. It's SuspeckTed's amazing and steady writing that keeps the attention. Keep on!
Reply #25 Top

i am sooo daft hehe