May 23, 2004

  • I don't have the answers...





    Clarification (so you know what your looking at): Blogger and Blogspot are really the same entity.  Blogger's the frontend and Blogspot's the hosting backend of the Great Google Blogging venture.


    1) Blogger and Xanga danced closely all through 2003 (top chart).  But in mid-January 2004, Xanga shot skyward.  I've looked back at John's posts and can't really find a defining moment.  At that time, Xanga was redoing 'Subscriptions' - nothing one would suspect to attract a huge new audience.  What's your best guess about Xanga's mid-January incandescence?


    2) Both Xanga and Blogger have weekly up-and-down cycles (middle chart).  But when Xanga's up (Sat and Sun), Blogger's down and otherwise (midweek).  I didn't expect this at all, but expected the weekly ebb and flows of these two to coincide.  Anyone have any brainstorming notions to explain why they appear precisely out of phase?


    3) The mid-May acceleration in Blogger traffic (bottom chart) coincides with "The Great Blogger Relaunch" headed up by none other than Xanga's ex-'Creative Director', Biz Stone.  Biz, who still exists as 'Genius' on Xanga and also has his own blog, was most likely the 'creative directing' force behind Xanga's early spamming marketing under the guise of the infamous Bianca Broussard.  Blogger has just come up with some new features: comments, profiles, and photoblogging.  My wonder: Will Biz's infusion of 'genius' into Blogger return Blogger to the pre-eminence it once held over Xanga?  Will Biz spam Xanga bloggers with Bianca2? Will Blogger's heavyweight backing from Google eventually pay-off and return Xanga to the status of stepchild once again?


    4) Finally, now that Xanga has broken into the coveted 'Top 100' traffic websites on the web (yesterday it was 89th), will it decide to leverage its marketable standing to make more money with new business initiatives?  Or is it already making incredible heaps just on Premium alone?  Or will Microsoft see Xanga as a jeweled stepping-stone to Bill Gates latest vision ("Bill Touts Blogs")?  Xanga as an acquisition for Microsoft, partnered and spotlighted  by the soon-to-be-appearing  Google-rivaling search tool MSN Blogbot?

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