Metablogging Puzzle
For the last month or more, whenever I check my weblog statistics to see what countries my readers represent, I have gotten a list much like today’s: in order from 1 to 25, USA, Iceland, unknown, Germany, EU, Netherlands, Australia, UK, Canada, Switzerland, Hungary, Russia, China, Japan, Spain, Malaysia, France, Brazil, Italy, Belgium, Singapore, South Africa, Lithuania, Austria, and Poland.
In general, the list is unsurprising: these are all countries with a large number (though not necessarily a large percentage) of English-fluent computer-owners. France and Italy are a bit lower than I would have expected, Malaysia and Lithuania quite a bit higher, but the huge anomaly is in second place: Iceland is the source of more hits than country outside the US, and that is also true for my non-pseudonymous Classics site. What’s that all about? Are there that many ‘Dr. Weevil’ fans in Iceland, or is it just a few obsessives (or even one?) checking in every half-hour to see what’s new? I’m not unhappy, or unwelcoming, just puzzled.