No Picture, a Few Links, and a Rambling Lemming

Due to circumstances beyond the Lemming's control, today's image cannot be displayed.

The Lemming is not making this up, and Blogger's new-found concern over the dangers of .jpg and other image files almost makes sense.

The Lemming apologizes, and hopes that you will be patient while the Lemming, Norbert Nerdly — you may have met him in December 18, 2015's post, and the Apathetic Lemming's staff of experts — all one of them — go not-so-quietly insane trying to figure out how Blogger's new-and-improved policy regarding .jpg and .png images, and other security threats, works.

That is, of course, assuming that the new-and-improved policy actually does work.

Thank you for your patience.

After this is over, the Lemming is seriously considering taking a vacation.

Stuff that doesn't have much to do with today's post:

• In Apathetic Lemming of the North
  • "In Retrospect"
    (pril 22, 2016)
  • "The Artifact"
    (April 15, 2016)
  • "Sunset Halo"
    (March 18, 2016)
  • "Meet Norbert Nerdly"
    (December 18, 2015)
• Somewhere else
  • Norski
    DeviantArt.com
    • Norski's Gallery

The Lemming Regrets ...

Apparently the circumstances are of a technical nature: something to do with a computer and preventive maintenance. Also mentioned by the Lemming: contemplation; a Nero Wolfe novel; and an easy chair.

Meanwhile, the Lemming suggests that readers look on the bright side: the Lemming could have asked Narcissus-X back as a guest blogger.


(Narcissus-X, proffering plenteous provisos. (August 14, 2015)

More — and less — related posts:

• "The Lemming Will Be Back"
  (September 28, 2015)
• "Escape From Klagfinster Poster"
  (September 25, 2015)
• "Island Flight"
  (September 11, 2015)
• "Speak Softly - - -"
  (September 4, 2015)
• "Narcissus-X Proffers Plenteous Provisos"
  (August 14, 2015)

The Lemming Will Be Back

First, the good news. The Lemming will be back.

Maybe that's not good news. It depends on your viewpoint, but the Lemming thing's it's a 'plus.'

Now, not-so-good news. The Lemming needs a vacation. More accurately, the Lemming is taking a vacation. It started several hours ago.

The Lemming shall return. There might even be something ready by Friday. Then again, maybe there won't. That depends on what the Lemming runs into during the next few days.

That didn't come out right. The Lemming doesn't run into things. Not that way. It depends on what the Lemming finds that might conceivably be of some interest.

No, that's too wordy.

The Lemming definitely needs a vacation, and will be back — as soon as the Lemming gets back, and not a minute sooner.

No Google Reader After June, But RSS Goes On

"How to Keep Following eagereyes After the End of Google Reader"
Robert Kosara, Blog, eagereyes (April 7, 2013)

"With Google Reader shutting down July 1st, now is the time to find alternative ways to follow your favorite blogs. For this one, you can now get new postings on Facebook and through a dedicated Twitter feed, in addition to the RSS feed. See below for some RSS aggregator/reader alternatives to Google Reader.

"Facebook and Twitter

"I don't use Facebook and Twitter to follow feeds, that's what I have my RSS reader for. But for people who like doing that, perhaps using Flipboard or similar, I have now created pure feed accounts. No talking, just links to new postings...."

The Google Reader has been a pretty good service, one the Lemming used occasionally. But as Robert Kosara points out, it's not the only way to keep track of blogs.

An important point is that RSS will still be around. Depending on who's talking, RSS stands for Rich Site Summary or Really Simple Syndication. It's a way to publish frequently-updated online content in a more-or-less standardized format. Google Reader used RSS, but it's far from the only RSS reader around.

In a way, today's situation reminds the Lemming of the days when America Online (AOL) was doing a good job of marketing its online community. Some folks seemed to think that AOL and the Internet were pretty much the same thing, and that's another topic.

Somewhat-related posts:

• "Google Reader Ending, FeedBurner, and This Blog"
  A Catholic Citizen in (April 14, 2013)
• "The Lemming's Got a Feed (big whoop)"
  (March 10, 2012)
• "Blogging is Dead! Long Live Blogging!"
  (December 16, 2010)
• " 'Machine Gun Twittering:' Probably Not Cool"
  (June 23, 2010)
• " 'How to Make Your Blog Stand Out:' Trite Title, Good Advice"
  (May 21, 2010)

Friday the Lemming Slept Late: Again

The Lemming isn't perfect. This morning's post may show up later this afternoon. Then again, maybe not.

Related posts:

• "Lemming Tracks: Friday, the Lemming Overslept"
  (January 11, 2013)
• "Lemming Tracks: No Pictures, Please! The Lemming is Busy"
  (August 24, 2012)
• "Lemming Tracks: It's Friday?!"
  (August 10, 2012)
• "Lemming Tracks, or, the Lemming Did it Again"
  (July 20, 2012)
• "Friday the Lemming Slept Late"
  (June 29, 2012)

Lemming Tracks: Friday, the Lemming Overslept

What?!

It's morning?! Already??!

Please be patient, the Lemming's been distracted. There should be a post about something ready in another few hours. If not, the Lemming will write about something else.

Probably.

Lemming Tracks: No Pictures, Please! The Lemming is Busy

The Lemming frantically assures visitors that there will be a post ready, later today: if the Lemming isn't interrupted. Again.

This time, the Lemming says that an unexpectedly hectic schedule pushed today's post aside: and that's the story the Lemming is sticking with.

And, seriously: no pictures of the Lemming, or today's post may not show up until next week!

Related post:

• "Lemming Tracks: It's Friday?!"
  (August 10, 2012)

Lemming Tracks, or, the Lemming Did it Again

Oops. It's Friday already. The Lemming's done it again. There's a post in progress. Thanks for your patience!

Five Tips for Blog Design: and a Tardy Lemming

"Blog Design: 5 Tips To Make You Look Like A Pro"
danielcassady, on Dragon Blogger (July 8, 2012)

"Anyone can start a blog. I mean that. You don't even need to have a fancy laptop or an internet connection. All you need is an idea, and it doesn't even have to be a good one....

"...But what many new bloggers don't realize is how important it is for you blog to look good, to be easy to read and navigate.

"What I'm talking about, after all this time, is design.

"We've all been to websites or blogs that we thought we're going be worthwhile but turned out to be a mess of dark blues and neon yellows, blogs that we would have loved to read but couldn't because the content was overtaken by images and sound effects.

"I don't want you to make those mistakes, and with these 5 simple tips I am going to help you avoid them...."

The guest post on Dragon Blogger could have been shorter, but so could many of the Lemming's posts. It's a fast read, though, and a pretty good refresher on blog design.

Someone starting out should, in the Lemming's opinion, read what danielcassady has to say: and read other 'how-2' posts and articles. The basic ideas in "5 Tips" are good, sound advice: the details are, again in the Lemming's opinion: a matter of opinion.

For example, Dragon Blogger has a 'banner' ad above the post: but "5 Tips" says ads should be kept in the sidebar. This isn't 'poor design,' and danielcassady has a valid point: make posts easy to find on the page, "...so that your readers can focus on what they came to you for, the content." The banner ad wide, but short: and Dragon Blogger posts have a largish, bold, titles. That sort of 'over the post' advertising doesn't get in the way of readers.

Of course, that's the Lemming's opinion.

Here are the five points: each comes with a few sentences.

• Who Are You Talking To
• The Box Exists For A Reason
• The Curious World Of Images
• The Details Are The Key
• Ads

This isn't the ultimate guide to good blog design: but it's a pretty good post.

Finally, about "and a Tardy Lemming" in the title: This post is about four hours late. A couple hours ago the Lemming realized that this isn't Thursday. It's been like that all week.

Sort-of-related posts:

• "Friday the Lemming Slept Late"
  (June 29, 2012)
• "How to Not Sound Crazy - or - THE PARANOIDS ARE AFTER ME!!!"
  (June 12, 2011)
• "Writing For Blogs: Pretty Good Advice, and a Seven-Point List"
  (June 14, 2010)
• " 'How to Make Your Blog Stand Out:' Trite Title, Good Advice"
  (May 21, 2010)
• "Blog Header Design: Pretty Good Advice"
  (March 30, 2010)

Friday the Lemming Slept Late

Oops. It's Friday, and the Lemming hasn't posted anything yet.



It's been one of those weeks: maybe later, after the Lemming has his coffee.

Allegedly-related posts:

• "Lemming Tracks: A Change in Schedule"
  (May 14, 2012)
• "The Lemming's Got a Feed (big whoop)"
  (March 10, 2012)
• "Lemming Tracks: Triskaidekaphobia and a Rambling Lemming"
  (January 13, 2012)
• "Lemming Tracks: "password" As a Password?!"
  (November 21, 2011)
• "'Cancer Causes Cell Phones!' - or, not"
  (July 18, 2011)

Lemming Tracks: A Change in Schedule

First, the good news: For the foreseeable future, the Lemming will keep on blogging.

Now, the maybe-not-entirely-good news: The Lemming's been getting frazzled. Also agitated, bothered, crazed, distracted, excited, flustered - all the way up to perturbed and pooped. Looking on the bright side, the Lemming's not bored. Actually, it may be impossible for the Lemming to get bored: this is a fascinating world, and that's almost another topic.



This is a slightly-serious post, so the Lemming will now drop the 'editorial we.' Or, in this case, the editorial Lemming.

I'm making another change in schedule for this blog, less than a year since the last one:

• "Lemming Tracks: Change in Schedule"
  (October 3, 2011)

This time, I'm cutting down to one post per week. Starting today, You can expect one post each Friday morning. The topic will be "whatever." Judging from my interests, that'll probably be science, technology, architecture, design, animals, art history, paleontology, or something else.

Why This Change?

I'm 60, and in pretty good health: apart from high blood pressure; diabetes; and a few other consequences of having survived this long.

I'm not complaining: particularly when I consider the alternative to having lived this long. But I also have to admit that I'm no longer a 40-year-old kid. I need sleep, regularly: and there are only so many hours in a day.

After taking a good look at my schedule, I decided that I can break out several days a week by cutting back on some of my routines. Which included the Monday and Wednesday posts for this blog.

Some fellows around my age might use those 'extra' days to go fishing, spend time kayaking on the Toulumne River, or meditate in a hammock. I've got some creative projects that have been collecting dust: for decades, in one case.

At the top of my to-do list is getting serious about comic strips. Maybe like the seven-panel thing I did in another blog:

"Narcissus-X: TRAPPED!"
Narcissus-X (February 11, 2011)















Or maybe something else.

Somewhat-related posts:

• "Lemming Tracks: Candles, Reports, Meetings, and a Busy Lemming"
  (December 7, 2011)
• "Lemming Tracks: The Lemming Hits the Big Six-Oh"
  (October 1, 2011)
• "Google's 13th, and Where Did the Month Go?!"
  (September 27, 2011)
• "Lemming Tracks: The Lemming's Back, and Pooped"
  (August 10, 2011)
• "Lemming Tracks: The Lemming's Taking a Sabbatical, Sort Of"
  (July 26, 2011)

The Lemming's Got a Feed (big whoop)

This will not change the destiny of civilization, end poverty, or cure the common cold: but the Lemming thinks it's a pretty big deal, anyway.

Apathetic Lemming of the North is now available in a new (to the Lemming) format:

• Apathetic Lemming of the North (on feedburner)
  (feeds.feedburner.com/ApatheticLemmingOfTheNorth)

You might even want to subscribe to that feed. Or, not.

One more thing: the feed's got advertising, which shouldn't get in the way too much. The Lemming's got bills to pay, like everybody else: and that's another topic.

The Lemming will be back, with something interesting (maybe), on Monday.

Vaguely-related posts:

• "Top 10 Blog Design Mistakes"
  (December 14, 2011)
• "Silly Season"
  (August 24, 2010)
• "Twitter, Hashtags, and Boring Stuff Like That"
  (July 6, 2010)
• "Blog Comments Categorized: Encouragers to Aliens"
  (May 28, 2010)
• "Inbound Link Dead! Twitter Did It! (maybe so, maybe not)"
  (September 22, 2009)

Lemming Tracks: Candles, Reports, Meetings, and a Busy Lemming

This has been a hectic 10 days for the Lemming. Take today's post, for example. Not this one, the "Museum of Modern Art: MoMA isn't a Japanese Cartoon Character" one that was supposed to get posted about seven hours ago.

That post's time stamp looks okay: but nobody could read it until a few minutes ago.

Sorry about that.

Candles, Video, and the Lemming

All of which has nothing to do with this post's video about a candle that burns in a circle. Candles like that are what's been keeping the Lemming busy. They're made by Spiral Light Candle Corporation. ("A Candle With a Twist")

Now, some blatant self-promotion:

• Spiral Light Candle Corporation
  (spirallightcandle.com)
  • Video
  • P.O. Box 868
    Hillsboro, ND 58045
    Telephone (701) 425-0682
• Spiral Light Candle Corp. Storefront
  On Amazon.com

Work, North Dakota, and a Busy Lemming

At this moment, the Lemming is wrapping up some work at the Spiral Light Candle office in Hillsboro, North Dakota. Near Hillsboro, actually. We're about two miles out of town.

Until today, the Lemming could get his work done at his own desk, down in central Minnesota. That's good news for the Lemming, and an example of working from home, telecommuting, and other Information Age stuff. The Lemming's discussed Flash, a movie about coffee, and clueless supervisors in another blog: which doesn't have much to do with finding more space for Spiral Light Candle's factory.

Finding more floor space for a candle factory is what brought the Lemming to North Dakota. Spiral Light Candle is looking for a building to move into early next year: and the Lemming's presence was wanted at a meeting involved in that process. All of which may sound more highfalutin than it really is.

The meeting's over, the Lemming's been getting a bit more work done, and soon it'll be time to head back to Minnesota.

Life, Blogging, and All That

The next post in this blog should get posted Friday morning, which gives the Lemming a whole day to get something ready. If writing for this blog was all that the Lemming did, that'd be plenty of time: but there's more to life than blogging, even for an apathetic Lemming.

See you Friday morning: probably.

Almost-not-entirely-unrelated posts:

• "Lemming Tracks: The Lemming's Back, and Pooped"
  (August 10, 2011)
• "Lemming Tracks: The Lemming's Taking a Sabbatical, Sort Of"
  (July 26, 2011)
• "How to Not Sound Crazy - or - THE PARANOIDS ARE AFTER ME!!!"
  (June 12, 2011)
• "Lemming Tracks: Due to Lack of Interest, Monday has been Canceled"
  (June 6, 2011)
• "And Now, for Something Completely Different: a Spiral Candle Video"
  (March 16, 2011)

Lemming Tracks: Change in Schedule

The Lemming turned 60 last Friday. ("Lemming Tracks: The Lemming Hits the Big Six-Oh" (October 1, 2011) That's a big deal for the Lemming: and marks the start of a new schedule for posts in this blog.

There's an explanation for why the Lemming's messing with routine coming later in this post. First, though, here's what to expect in Apathetic Lemming of the North: each Monday, Wednesday, and Friday.

'Topic of the day,' by blog:

		A Catholic Citizen in America	Apathetic Lemming of the North	Sauk Centre Journal
Sunday		Being Catholic		Weekly post
Monday		Featured topic	Science and technology
Tuesday
Wednesday		Studying the Bible and Catechism	Architecture and design
Thursday
Friday		My take on the news	Whatever
Saturday

The Lemming's rapidly running out of Monday, so here's a (fairly) brief explanation for the change in schedule. It's from another blog, where the Lemming doesn't use the 'editorial we.'

Never mind. Here's the story:

Scheduled Creativity?!

Over the years I've had quite a few jobs, from beet chopper and delivery guy to advertising copywriter and graphic designer. Then there were those stints as a radio disk jockey. And a high school teacher. Not at the same time, of course.

I've learned quite a few things, including the value of time management. Which is why there are changes coming in this and some other blogs.

I'd like to divide my time like this:

1. 100%
   Creative projects
   • Some of which have been on the back burner for
     • years
     • Decades
2. 100%
   Researching and writing posts for
   • This blog
   • My other blogs,
     [Get ready for shameless self-promotion]
     including
     • Apathetic Lemming of the North
       Micro-reviews, plus the occasional rant, Monday, Wednesday, and Friday: Technical difficulties, the nature of the universe, and whim permitting
     • A Catholic Citizen in America
       Following Catholic beliefs and practices in America: One man's experience
       
     • Sauk Centre Journal Blog
       Small town life, the way it is in this central Minnesota town
     • Drifting at the Edge of Time and Space
       Notes and ruminations of a writer, recapturing traces of a decades-old dream
     • Narcissus-X
       A blog entirely devoted to the Narcissus-X blog and Narcissis-X, the blogger who blogs on Narcissus-X, about Narcissus-X
3. 100%
   Tales of
   • Loonfoot Falls
     • Small town life, the way it never was
   • Galaxy Cadet
     • Heroics and hairspray in the 27th century
   • Castle Dampthorn
     • I don't even have a tagline for this one

Obviously, that won't work, since about two thirds of the way into "100% Creative projects," I'd start eating into the time I need for sleep.

If I discipline myself to spend no more time on each post in the new schedule than I do now, I should have about three days a week available for 'catching up. That's a big if, though: I've tried this sort of thing before.

We'll see how this goes.

Almost-related posts:

• "Lemming Tracks: The Lemming Hits the Big Six-Oh"
  (October 1, 2011)
• "Google's 13th, and Where Did the Month Go?!"
  (September 27, 2011)
• "Lemming Tracks: The Lemming's Back, and Pooped"
  (August 10, 2011)
• "Catholic Marketing Network Trade Show: Second Morning on the Floor"
  A Catholic Citizen in America (August 4, 2011)
• "Lemming Tracks: The Lemming Gets Transparent"
  (April 18, 2011)

Google's 13th, and Where Did the Month Go?!

"Google Turns 13 With Birthday Doodle"
PCMag.com (September 27, 2011)


"Google is now officially a teenager. The search giant on Tuesday celebrated its 13th birthday with a homepage doodle that features the company's logo surrounded by presents and a cake.

"The image is framed as if it were a snapshot in an old photo album, and several letters in the Google logo are donning party hats for the occasion.

" 'Happy 13th Birthday, Google!' Google's Marissa Mayer tweeted this morning...."

These 'Google doodles' are getting to be a whole lot more than just doodles. Make that 'have gotten.' PCMag.com goes into some of the history of these little art pieces.

"...Google has celebrated its birthday with doodles for the past few years, each one more sophisticated than the next. Back in 2008, the company celebrated a decade in business by displaying the original Google logo, also adorned with party hats. The following year, the company replaced the L in Google with two ones to honor its eleventh year. Last year, 89-year-old Los Angeles painter Wayne Thiebaud crafted a painting of a cake, with a single candle replacing the L...."

Then the article goes into the more practical, business side of Google.

"While Google.com was registered on September 15, 1997, Google didn't actually incorporate as a company, release early technical specs, or hire its first employee until September 1998. Now, 13 years later, it has almost 30,000 employees and reported $9.03 billion during its last quarter...."

The Lemming enjoys these 'doodles,' celebrating more-or-less-famous birthdays and events. The Google birthday, by happy coincidence, is within a few days of the Lemming's. The date, that is. The Lemming's gone past 13, 26, and 39 - and hits 60 this year.

Which brings the Lemming around to what happened to this blog: No posts for almost a month?!

Blogging's Fine: and So is the Lemming

Somewhat ominously, this blog's last post - before this one, of course - was about the "continuing 'death' of blogging." Also Hula Hoops. There's a connection. Not that blogging is dead, or Hula Hoops. Or, for that matter, the Lemming.

Which is quit a relief. Particularly considering who's writing this post. Which threatens to take this discussion into a very weird area.

Getting back to blogging and the Lemming, it's been a distracting month. There's been more activity related to the Spiral Light Candle Corp. - a shameless shout-out, the Lemming freely admits. The Lemming enjoyed - thoroughly - being the company gofer at a trade show in Pennsylvania, and is still recovering from the experience.

Good grief, 60 isn't that old - - - more topics.

The Lemming had a point to make. Where is it? Or, rather, what was it?

Google, blogging, trade show, pooped. Got it. Right.

Besides being pooped and distracted, the Lemming's been thinking about something besides this blog and fancy candles: which didn't help get posts out.

Sad to say, the Lemming even missed the annual Talk Like a Pirate Day - arrrr!

This is where the Lemming should let you know what wonderful things are in store for this blog: new horizons, new formats, maybe even a new post or two!

Well, that's not gonna happen. Besides blogging, the Lemming has dishes to wash: and sleep to be slept.

Tomorrow's another day though, at least the Lemming is assuming that will be the case. The Lemming plans to get another post out then. Of course, the Lemming planned to get at the dishes before this: yet again another topic.

Good night.

Vaguely-related posts:

• Google, pretty much
  • "Comics Artist Will Eisner: Born 94 Years Ago Today"
    (March 6, 2011)
  • "Flintstone's 50th, Google Doodles, and All That"
    (September 30, 2010)
  • "Google Pulling Out of China? I've Heard Worse News"
    (March 14, 2010)
  • "New Google Themes: Comics, This Time"
    (July 23, 2009)
  • "Google Drops Inner City News: Censorship? or a Reasonable Response to Complaints?"
    (February 18, 2008)
• Lemming Tracks
  • "Lemming Tracks: The Continuing 'Death' of Blogging, Hula Hoops, and Getting a Grip"
    (August 28, 2011)
  • "Lemming Tracks: The Lemming's Back, and Pooped"
    (August 10, 2011)
  • "Lemming Tracks: The Lemming's Taking a Sabbatical, Sort Of"
    (July 26, 2011)
  • "'Cancer Causes Cell Phones!' - or, not"
    (July 18, 2011)
  • "Lemming Tracks: Sauk Centre Storm and the Lemming"
    (July 13, 2011)

Lemming Tracks: The Continuing 'Death' of Blogging, Hula Hoops, and Getting a Grip

"Gawker and 7 Other Formerly Popular Sites That Are Dead or Dying"
John Brandon, Technology, FoxNews.com (August 25, 2011)

"Sunny days sometimes turn dark and dismal. A shirt that looked good on the rack at Target now sits in the bargain bin at Staples. And, that new car with the Hemi engine and the third-row back-seat? It now drives like a crusty tank.

"The same is true of web sites. What seemed so fresh when you first registered now seems like a ghost town. What happened? According to Gartner analyst Michael Gartenberg, site visitors routinely check the door to see if anyone else is leaving for better services. Like lemmings, they can pull up stakes and leave in a heartbeat. (Facebook, are you listening?) All you can hear are the crickets...."

The article - op-ed? - is an entertaining read, and informative. But the Lemming suggests not swallowing its conclusions whole. A little mental chewing might help prevent intellectual indigestion. Enough with that metaphor.

John Brandon lists eight websites that are on the decline:

1. Gawker.com
2. Chatroulette.com
3. Digg.com
4. MySpace.com
5. Bebo.com
6. Salon.com
7. Blogger/Typepad
8. Slashdot.org

He could be right.

A lot depends on how growth or decline gets measured: and how that data is interpreted. The Lemming will get back to that.

Here's what Mr. John Brandon has to say about Blogger, and blogging in general:

"...7. Blogger/Typepad

"Blogging is dead – or at least it has shifted to another medium. Now, instead of typing several pages worth of material, most Web users just tap in a 140-character sentiment on Twitter. 'Long-form' blogging is not as popular, and we all know the jokes about the blogger in his parent's basement. Sites like Blogger.com and TypePad.com have declined considerably of late, dropping about 25-30 percent in user visits per Compete.com. Granted, some have discovered the streamlined blogging tool WordPress.com, which has enjoyed steady growth the past few years...."

"Blogging is dead"??

The phrase has a dramatic ring to it. If it sounds familiar, you follow the news. And maybe this blog:

• "Blogging is Dead! Long Live Blogging!"
  (December 16, 2010)
  A micro-review of
  • "Blogging 'Peaks,' But Reports of Its Death Are Exaggerated"
    Ryan Singel, Epicenter, Wired, (December 16, 2010)

Data, Change, and Hula Hoops

Change happens. It's one of the few things people experience that doesn't change:

"Nothing endures but change."
(Heraclitus, 540 BC - 480 BC)

Get a data set about something that covers a span of time, it'll be odd if something doesn't change. Sometimes the change is seasonal, or periodic in some other way: like breathing. Inhaling, exhaling, and repeating the cycle is normal: a vital, literally, part of the human experience. And that's another topic.

Growth, or lack thereof, is important to Americans. It's a cultural thing, the Lemming suspects.

For products and services, growth and decline can be seasonal: seriously, how many folks are likely to buy a snowmobile in the middle of summer? That's why you'll hear "seasonally adjusted" in business news now and then.

Sometimes growth is fairly fast, like sales figures for pet rocks back in the '70s. Sometimes a fad turns into a part of the culture, like the Hula Hoop.

The Hula Hoop is 'dead,' in the sense that production probably isn't at the 20,000-a-day peak Wham-O had, to keep up with demand back in the '50s. They sold about 25,000,000 in two months.

Folks just don't buy that many Hula Hoops these days. But they're still sold. The Lemming found Wham-O Original Hula Hoop in a Google Product Search, and has seen similar products in stores most summers.

Sugar Spikes, Fads, and Getting a Grip

Fads are fine, fun, and fraught with fortuity: also peril.

It's great news for a company, when their product becomes a fad. The 'sugar spike' of demand makes it possible for them to build factories, buy material, and hire folks to make enough troll dolls to keep up with demand.

That's the good news. The bad news is that if someone goofs, the company can end up with tons of custom-made equipment, loan payments coming due, and warehouses full of troll dolls - or whatever - that nobody wants to buy. Not at the a price that's enough to cover the company's expenses.

Turns out, blogging is a fad. Blogger, anyway. CNET put Blogger (1999) at #9 in its list of top Web fads:

• "Top 10 Web fads"
  Molly Wood, The Power of 10, CNET

The list includes Hampsterdance (1998) at #1, and All your Base are Belong to Us (1998 - 2001) at #3.

Okay - Blogger may be a fad. Arguably, blogging is a fad: One that's peaked. That doesn't mean that either is 'dead.' The Lemming's been over this before:

"...The article hit, in the Lemming's opinion, on an important point with this: That folks may have discovered that blogging is '...too much work for too few readers....'

"Considering how much work writing is, it's amazing that so many folks stayed at blogging for so long. Blogging - any sort of writing - is work for the Lemming, too....

"...It's unlikely, in the Lemming's opinion, that blogging is 'dead.' Changing, yes.

"As for fearing that 'nuanced' communication is done for? The Lemming remembers quite a few of the 'good old days.' And, as I've said a few times recently: they weren't."
(December 16, 2010)

More-or-less-related posts:

• "How to Not Sound Crazy - or - THE PARANOIDS ARE AFTER ME!!!"
  (June 12, 2011)
• "Lemming Tracks: The Last of the Blogger Crash?"
  (May 13, 2011)
• "Lemming Tracks: The Lemming is Cutting Back"
  (February 21, 2011)
• "Blogging is Dead! Long Live Blogging!"
  (December 16, 2010)
• "Blog Comments Categorized: Encouragers to Aliens II - The Response"
  (June 4, 2010)

How to Not Sound Crazy - or - THE PARANOIDS ARE AFTER ME!!!

"Tips for Not Appearing Crazy on the Internet"
Frank J. Fleming, Pajamas Media (June 12, 2011)

"How conspiracy nuts, basket cases, paranoid loons, and other half wits can fool the rest of us into thinking they make perfect sense.

"Do crazy people have a right to be heard? I think they do - as long as they're American. But even with crazy people's well known infiltration of the internet - appearing in any blog or news comments section or online forum they can access - they still have a lot of trouble getting people to listen to them.

"In a recent column, I touched on the topic of conspiracy theories, which of course brought in lots of crazy people to the comments section. As I looked through the responses, I noticed how easy it was to scan them or just read the first sentence and say, 'Well, this one is a crazy person.' And lots of people scan like this, because crazy people have this habit of self-identifying on the internet that allows sane people to skip over what they have to say before even getting to the crazy point. Thus crazy people never even get heard.

The advent of the internet should be a Renaissance for crazy...."

The problem, it seems, is that even on the Internet: crazy people write like crazy people. So, sometimes, do sane people.

The Lemming doubts that a crazy person¹ will read Mr. Fleming's article, take careful note of his advice: and start writing in a sane, coherent way. Not often, anyway.

There's a list of points, each of which is discussed. Sanely. With humor.

• Caps lock is your enemy
  • EXCESSIVE EXCLAMATION MARKS, TOO!
• i can haz proper grammar?
• No long screeds
  • Especially in comments left on other people's blogs
• Proofread
• Don't be surprised when people have opinions different from your crazy one
• No living person is Hitler
  • And the world isn't ending
• Respond to an actual point
  • Not just something that's been mentioned

Here's the final bit of advice, or, rather, encouragement, Mr. Flemming gives to crazy bloggers:

"...And yet he's still treated by many as a serious pundit because he has the discipline to make it so it's not blatantly obvious to a casual reader that he's Kleenex-boxes-for-shoes, the-squirrels-are-spying-on-me, kung-fu-fighting-invisible-ninjas crazy.

"So give it a try in the comments, crazy people. Use these tips to try and make yourselves look sane as you argue that we still need to investigate WTC-7 or that there are many signs that Obama's birth certificate is fake or that Ron Paul is the last hope for America. Get yourselves heard, crazy people! "

And remember: THE PARANOIDS ARE WATCHING EVERY MOVE YOU MAKE!!!!!

Not-completely-unrelated posts:

• "Lemming Tracks: The Lemming Gets Transparent"
  (April 18, 2011)
• "Lemming Tracks: Anonymity, Blogs, and Making a Point"
  (February 10, 2011)
• "Blogging is Dead! Long Live Blogging!"
  (December 16, 2010)
• "Writing For Blogs: Pretty Good Advice, and a Seven-Point List"
  (June 14, 2010)
• "Blog Comments Categorized: Encouragers to Aliens II - The Response"
  (June 4, 2010)

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A tip of the hat to Londiniensis, on Twitter, for the heads-up on this article.

¹ The Lemming's a bit "crazy," sort of. See:

• "Brilliant, Talented, and On Medication"
  A Catholic Citizen in America (November 30, 2010)
• "ADHD, an Apostolic Exhortation, Another Document, and V8"
  A Catholic Citizen in America (November 11, 2010)
• "Medication for Depression? Yeah: The Catholic Church is Okay With That"
  A Catholic Citizen in America (February 25, 2010)

Lemming Tracks: Due to Lack of Interest, Monday has been Canceled

The Lemming decided to take Monday off, sort of.

However, just so you won't have checked this blog in vain, here's a short selection of posts the Lemming's committed over the last couple years.

• "Evidence of Human Compassion: 500,000 Years Ago"
  (October 13, 2010)
• "Nuclear Weapons, Space Aliens, Conspiracy Theories, and Getting a Grip"
  (September 24, 2010)
• "Data-Driven Art: For an 'Overwhelmed' 'Hive Mind???' "
  (January 27, 2010)
• "Better Ideas From France: A Hamster Cage for Humans"
  (November 11, 2009)
• "Warp Drive Might Not Be Stable: Physicists Take Another look at Alcubierre's Work"
  (June 12, 2009)

The Lemming expects to be back tomorrow.

Thanks for visiting.

Lemming Tracks: The Last of the Blogger Crash?

Both posts in this blog that were (temporarily) lost during the 30-hour-plus Blogger crash this week are back. One of them even had an accurate time-and-date stamp.

That was before the Lemming fixed a glitch in the posts' tags.

Here's a sample of the 'funny' tags:



Just to make things more interesting, that character string, complete with weird characters, showed up when the Lemming tried keying tags into a new post.

Apparently the 'auto-fill' feature in Blogger interpreted any character as those 'funny' ones.

The temporarily-lost post from May 12, 2011 got a new time-and-date stamp when the Lemming saved it, with corrected tags, this evening. That was an easy fix.

On the other hand, the Lemming feels that this bodes ill for Blogger's zowie-keen new Blogger version.

The Lemming has nothing against 'upgrades,' provided that they actually work - and don't make routine processes more difficult.

Then there's the recurring IT department nightmare: management-mandated upgrades just before critical high-use periods. Like Thanksgiving-to-Christmas in American retail stores.

Oh, well, at least Blogger has been working pretty much okay this evening.

The Lemming hopes we've seen the first - and last - big Blogger crash this year.

Related post:

• "Blogger's Back - So is Most of This Blog"
  (May 13, 2011)

Blogger's Back - So is Most of This Blog

---

Update (5/13/2011 6:15 p.m. Central/11:15 p.m. GMT/UTC)
This blog's two missing posts are back:

• "Crab Nebula Superflare: It's Not Supposed to Do That"
  (May 13, 2011 (original post: May 12, 2011)
• "Lemming Tracks: Rules Should Make Sense"
  (May 11, 2011)

The Lemming is relieved!

---

First, the good news: The Lemming is now able to use Blogger's editing/posting service.

That's nice.

Now, the bad news: Wednesday's post is still missing. So is Thursday's.

That's frustrating: since the Lemming had opined about a (daft, in the Lemming's opinion) decision by school authorities (on Wednesday); and about the Crab Nebula (on Thursday).

Credit where credit is due, though: Blogger has acknowledged that there's something wrong - and been giving folks in the Lemming's position status reports.

Here's what Blogger has to say about the situation, in part:

"Friday, May 13, 2011

"Blogger is back now. We're still working on restoring some of the data. For more details, see this post: http://buzz.blogger.com/2011/05/blogger-is-back.html

"Posted by Chang at 10:32 PDT..."
(status.blogger.com)

That's good news, too, in a way :"still working on restoring some of the data." The Lemming hopes that the two missing posts from this blog is among the data they're working on restoring.

No rant, by the way: Blogger's system is big, complex - and SNAFUs happen.

Blogger's folks have a few words to say, themselves:

• "Blogger is back"
  Blogger Buzz (May 13, 2011)

The Blogger shutdown isn't exactly front-page-headline material, but it has made the news:

"Google's Blogger was recovering on Friday from an outage that knocked the popular service offline.

"A Google spokesman said at 12:30 pm (1630 GMT) that users had been unable to publish on Blogger for the past 19 hours.

" 'Recovery is underway and we expect things to be back to normal soon,' the Google spokesman told AFP in an email. 'We're very sorry for the inconvenience this is causing.'...

"...Visitors who attempted to access the site at blogger.com were met with the message: 'Blogger is unavailable right now. We apologize for this interruption in service.'...

"...Google was providing updates on Blogger's status at its official Twitter account, @Blogger, and on its status page at status.blogger.com."
(AFP)

---

"Google got Blogger back online late this morning following a maintenance-related glitch that kept blogs dark for more than 20 hours.

" 'We're nearly back to normal -- you can publish again, and in the coming hours posts and comments that were temporarily removed should be restored,' Eddie Kessler, tech Lead/manager at Blogger, wrote in a post on the Blogger Buzz site at around 10:30 a.m. PT....

"...Here's what happened: during scheduled maintenance work Wednesday night, we experienced some data corruption that impacted Blogger's behavior. Since then, bloggers and readers may have experienced a variety of anomalies including intermittent outages, disappearing posts, and arriving at unintended blogs or error pages. A small subset of Blogger users (we estimate 0.16%) may have encountered additional problems specific to their accounts. Yesterday we returned Blogger to a pre-maintenance state and placed the service in read-only mode while we worked on restoring all content: that's why you haven't been able to publish. We rolled back to a version of Blogger as of Wednesday May 11th, so your posts since then were temporarily removed. Those are the posts that we're in the progress of restoring.'

"The publishing site has millions of active blogs, he said.

"Updated 10:59 a.m. PT to say Blogger is back up and provide more details."
(CNET)

---

"If you’re one of the many people that uses Blogger, a free blogging service owned by Google, you may have noticed some issues with your blog lately – namely, that you can’t update it. Blogger users have been locked out of their blogs since Wednesday night when a behind-the-scenes maintenance update went wrong.

"Users were informed on Monday that there would be an outage on Wednesday at 10 p.m. PST for an hour-long maintenance update. However, at 11 p.m., Blogger wasn’t back up. Blogger users were unable to update their blogs, and haven’t been able to for about 36 hours. Site content has been put into read-only mode, which means visitors can still come to the blog and read posts, but bloggers just can’t add any new material.

"As if that wasn’t bad enough, any posts that were added after 7:37 a.m. PST on Wednesday have been removed. We’re not sure if the content is just missing temporarily, or if the content is gone forever. We’re hoping it’s not the latter....

"...Owned and operated by Google since 2003, Blogger is mostly used as a personal blog platform. However, Google uses it as its blogging platform for its Gmail and YouTube official blogs among others. This means that if any of these popular services have announced news in the last 36 hours or so, Google has been unable to blog about it."
(Geek.com) [emphasis mine]

---

One of the reasons that the Lemming has used Blogger for years is that it's huge - and so is likely to get noticed by search engines. Think about it: If you were running a startup search site, would you take extra time to make sure that your bots paid attention to some blogging service run, say, out of someone's basement in central Minnesota?

Another reason the Lemming has used Blogger is that Google owns Blogger - and uses Blogger. The Lemming figures that the folks running Google aren't particularly daft, and will realized that it's in their own best interest to keep their blogging platform in working order.

Back to the news.

"Blogger is still down, after a routine maintenance update on Wednesday appears to have caused a major malfunction in the popular online publishing platform....

"...For blogophiles, this is a huge blow. No new postings from your favorite blogs, and no way to blog about the stress this is causing you....

"...By Friday morning, even viewing the blogs was shut down. For many people, reading the blogs they follow is as routine as watching the morning news, or drinking their morning coffee. How would your life be changed if these routine activities were suddenly taken away? No doubt, withdrawal would soon set in. If you are a blogger or blog reader, what are you doing today?"
(Gather.com)

---

In my case, it's not quite as bad as Gather.com said. The Lemming's blogs are avaiable for reading. It was editing and posting that wouldn't work. Editing which included adding a URL that's missing from one of those also-missing posts.

Now, some blatant self-promotion. Blogs which you should be able to read. For the time being:


A Catholic Citizen in America


Through One Dad's Eye


Drifting at the Edge of Time and Space


Apathetic Lemming of the North

Now, one more bit of news, from yesterday:

"Google's Blogger service has been offline or unreliable for much of the day, with Blogger-hosted blogs changed to read-only mode, and posts and comments made after 7:37 a.m. PDT on May 11, 2011, removed....

"...Blogger had started rolling out its first major redesign in years in April. The team said in a tweet that the outage was not related to launching the new design."
(All Things Digital, CNET News)

---

The Lemming sincerely hopes that the outage isn't related to the new design. If it is, Blogger is in for the sort of off-again-on-again sporadic service that was plaguing Twitter for a while. Neato-keen, spiffy, new bells and whistles are nice - but reliable performance is better. In the Lemming's opinion.

While blogger was offline, the Lemming took a sort of unplanned sabbatical from blogging, organized some data, worked on a little art, and relaxed.

Relaxing is good.

After Blogger, What?

The Lemming's been told that WordpPress is a nifty bit of software for bloggers. The Lemming's also been told how easy it is to work with WordPress code and tweak it. And how many delightful hours can be spent, tweaking WordPress software.

The Lemming has coded now and then - but the Lemming is one of those bloggers who prefers to do research and writing for blogs, not spend hours playing working with the software. That's one reason that the Lemming hasn't started using WordPress, or any other alternative to Blogger.

Another is the time it takes to set up something new.

The Lemming had quite a lot of time, yesterday, and today. Also a very real incentive to find a sort of backup for Blogger.

There's nothing ready for viewing, yet: but the Lemming is working toward having a sort of 'companion blog' for Apathetic Lemming of the North, and other blogs.

The Lemming has also started composing and saving blog posts before copying them into Blogger's service - in case this happens again.

Now, to see if this will get posted.

News and views:

• "Google's Blogger recovering from outage"
  AFP (May 13, 2011)
• "Google revives Blogger after outage"
  Elinor Mills, CNET News (May 13, 2011)
• "Blogger down for 36 hours but 'will be back to normal soon' "
  Jennifer Bergen, Geek.com (May 13, 2011)
• "Blogger Down for Second Consecutive Day"
  Gather (May 13, 2011)
• "Blogger goes down, taking 30 hours of posts with it"
  Liz Gannes, All Things Digital, CNET News (May 12, 2011)