Happy New Year to the wonderful members and readers that have made 2009 an incredible year for PlanetPOV!

The Planet officially opened in August 2009 with the 4 founding members, myself, KQuark, Kalima and KevenSeven.

As of today, we have 199 members (anyone know of someone who could make it an even 200 by tomorrow?),  448 Articles published and 22,330 Comments posted.

I wanted to take this opportunity to share some impressive stats about our site with all of you since you have made this all happen. According to Awstats on our server:

Total Number of Visits This Month (Dec 2009):

11,416

Total Number of Pages Viewed This Month (Dec 2009):

636,042

Total Number of Hits This Month (Dec 2009):

2,011,382

We also have some remarkable results from Google Analytics. They provide baseline numbers for sites of similar sizes and we are far and away exceeding the norms. Before getting to the nerdy numbers, here is some fun info on who’s visiting The Planet:

Number of Countries with Visitors to The Planet This Month:

61

Countries with Visitors to The Planet This Month (in order):

1. United States
2. Japan
3. United Kingdom
4. Canada
5. New Zealand
6. Germany
7. Slovenia
8. Nicaragua
9. Philippines
10. India
11. Barbados
12. Hong Kong
13. Australia
14. (not set)
15. Singapore
16. France
17. Turkey
18. Malaysia
19. China
20. Ireland
21. Russia
22. Pakistan
23. Senegal
24. Spain
25. Denmark
26. United Arab Emirates
27. Iran
28. Nigeria
29. Taiwan
30. South Africa
31. Switzerland
32. Hungary
33. Sweden
34. Israel
35. Argentina
36. Ghana
37. Luxembourg
38. Kuwait
39. Slovakia
40. Kyrgyzstan
41. Italy
42. Poland
43. Latvia
44. Lesotho
45. Sri Lanka
46. Thailand
47. Norway
48. Serbia
49. Guam
50. Indonesia
51. Côte d’Ivoire
52. Iraq
53. Dominican Republic
54. Netherlands
55. Austria
56. Czech Republic
57. Puerto Rico
58. Egypt
59. Papua New Guinea
60. Vietnam
61. Jamaica
62. Mauritius

Er…anyone know where Mauritius is? Actually, if you’re curious:

Mauritius, officially the Republic of Mauritius, is an island nation off the coast of the African continent in the southwest Indian Ocean, about 900 kilometres (560 mi) east of Madagascar. And someone there reads PlanetPOV too!

Now for some nerdy stuff, according to Google Analytics, here are yesterday’s numbers for The Planet and the average for sites of similar size:

Page Views in a Single Day (Dec 30):

PlanetPOV: 4,572
Similar Sites:  395

Average Visitor’s Time on Site on Dec 30:

PlanetPOV: 21:32
Similar Sites: 2:23

Pages Viewed Per Visit on Dec 30th

PlanetPOV: 15.55
Similar Sites: 3.35

Bounce Rate on Dec 30th (Percent of Visitors who view one page then leave)

PlanetPOV:  00.37%
Similar Sites:47.77%

All of our numbers and viewership are phenomenal! People all around the world are interested in and reading what you write. Keeping in mind that 2010 is an election year, I’m anticipating even greater interest and growth in The Planet this year.

So we’re off to a roaring start in 2010, we have a lot of momentum and everyone reading this deserves to take some credit for that.

I wish each of you a very happy, healthy and productive New Year and sincere gratitude from all the founders for everything you’ve contributed to this remarkable community of remarkable people we call PlanetPOV.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!

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javaz
Member

Did you get the 200th member?

Emerald1943
Member

Yes, indeedy!! taffybelle joined just before midnight!

Sorry you missed the festivities! It was nuts around here! And a good time was had by all!

Emerald1943
Member

Okay, all you beautiful PlanetPeople! I have GOT to get offline and get some housework done! It’s all you fault that it hasn’t been done in several days! You keep posting the most interesting comments that I just have to respond! Don’t stop, please!!

But I really have to sign off…beds unmade, trash to take out, sink full of dishes, and doggies that require some attention!

Have a super day everyone! I’ll be back later, no doubt! 🙂

abby4ever
Guest

And I have to bake that pie. See you back here in about an hour, Emerald. I will be back before then; you, you have one hour to get your house cleaned up.

You bring a lot of joy to these threads; it is, in part, your positive attitude that makes it that way.

One hour.

:]

Emerald1943
Member

Hey Abby, I took more than an hour…it took that long to get the kitchen into shape! But when I sat down to take a break, I couldn’t keep my eyes open! Had to take a little “kitty nap”! These miscreants here on the Planet kept me up waaay too late last night! 🙂

whatsthatsound
Member

2010 brings with it new hopes and new challenges, and asks the eternal question of mankind; are you ready to put aside your differences, or will another year go by with you stuck in the same rut? The immortal words of John Lennon ring out at this new dawn:

Man, you should have seen them kicking Edgar Allen Poe.

Emerald1943
Member

Beautiful, WTS! But I thought the eternal question was, “Are we alone in the universe?” Just kidding! 🙂

I have made a few resolutions…to get up off my lazy buns and do some things around the house that need doing. I don’t know how well this is going to work out. I have this problem, you see…it’s called blogging at the Planet! I am positively addicted!

I wish you only the very best in 2010!

KarateKid
Member

Happy New Year to all of my PlanetPOV friends. I hope everyone had a safe return home from the festivities. AdLib, may 2010 by a wonderful year for the Planet; I am confident your membership will grow by leaps and bounds this year.

Hopefully, the new decade will begin to bring the fruits of the government’s labors; there are indications.

I am in disagreement with the administration on some issues, but BHO is still the man and the other side have no one that can match him, and they know it. So, let them bloviate, and in November let’s show them how America really feels.

May 2010 bring health and happiness to everyone here.

Emerald1943
Member

Happy New Year, KK!

Regarding the disagreement with the administration, I would have to agree with you. There have been some things that have given me pause. But the one thing we MUST recognize is that unless we as Democrats stick together and fight the republican attack machine this year, they will make substantial gains, perhaps taking control of the Senate again. This frightens me more than anything!

I hope we can convince everyone who worked to get President Obama elected to once again get energized and get out the vote! If the Democrats stay home, you know what can happen.
I plan to do everything in my power to see that it doesn’t!

Again, my best wishes for a wonderful New Year! And my thanks…it just may have been your invite that brought me here!

moongal6
Member

Happy New Year to everyone! It is a dark and stormy night here at the beach in Oregon. New ideas on the horizon. Always hopeful.
Blessings.

abby4ever
Guest

Even though I’ve only been at Planet a little over 10 days and subsequently have contributed virtually nothing to this place, I feel a sense of pride in reading these stats, pride in being invited here by two fine posters (who may already be regretting their invitation, ha!) and pride in being here, in being on a site that has had such success in such a short period of time. The good stats do not surprise me, for at Planet I’ve seen some great topics written by some great writers, all this topped off by some great responses, three elements that are essential to gaining, and holding, the attention of those visiting the site.

I’ve never been able to decide which of these is the most important: expressing one’s thoughts with as much courage and honesty as one can muster, or provoking thought (ideally, deep thought) in others, even those who have never been much on mulling over the difficult political (or quasi-political, or even the only-just-barely political) concept.

Of course, it is in being honest and brave in expressing our thoughts, arguments, and personal positions, and devil take any heat we might take for doing so, that we have the best chance of provoking thought in others, thought that may end up hidden away in a diary or, instead, end up changing the world. Or something inbetween.

I don’t envy the editors here. One of the driving considerations at this place is providing an arena of total freedom of expression. You can’t even begin to be honest and brave in expressing yourself, without it. And yet there is that line between total freedom and some kind of abuse of that total freedom; the editors sometimes have to knock us back a bit if we get too, shall we say, rambunctuous. E.g. giving some troll or other what for, or just mouthing off (alas, one of my fortes) in a thoughtless way that does no one any good and may even do damage. The editors’ task is easy when we are safely on the right side of the line, and easy when we are dangerously on the wrong side of the line; it’s when we are right on the line that things get a bit sticky for them.

Given some of the sites some of us have been frequenting, and still on occasion frequent, where our every word is moderated, the freedom we have here to express ourselves, is heady. Who knew?

But here at Planet I see real respect among members for other members, even in situations where the disagreement over some issue or other, is intense, perhaps even explosive at times. Head-to-head disagreements, here, do not seem to result in the kinds of verbal bloodbaths you see at other sites. Quelle relief.

In a word and just for what the opinion of a brand new member may be worth, I think Planet is, pretty much and among its competitors, the bee’s knees.

Congrats to its founders and contributors and may the stats only get better and better. Thanks for collecting and providing them, Ad Lib.

abby

Hopeington
Member
Hopeington

Cosign….
Thoughtful ramblings Abby!!
Happy New Year

abby4ever
Guest

Thanks, Hopeington. I think. I am trying to learn to not just ramble…heh.

Wishing you..and all here…a joyous New Year.

Emerald1943
Member

Abby, what an excellent comment! This could have been an article, standing on its own! I was thinking many of the same thoughts about the Planet.

You underestimate your contributions, I feel. As for being a “newbie” here, we are all essentially new, none of us having been here more than a few months since the Planet was only born in August. What has impressed me has been the depth and intelligence of the people who have gravitated here. Who could have known from the short comments at HP that there was such a wealth of great opinions just waiting for a place to be expressed?? I am blown away on a daily basis! HP has lost more than they will ever know!

Hope your turkey turns out well! That’s one of my few specialities in the kitchen! Constant basting is my trick.
Enjoy!

Have a great day, sweetie! I’ll be available to help you get rid of those left-overs! 🙂

abby4ever
Guest

Thank you so much for your kind words about my reply to Ad Lib’s post. I did think about making it into an article, after I posted it; but it was too late by then. I don’t think we can switch around, i.e. take a reply we’ve done and redo it as an article. Even if we can, there’s no real need: it can be read as easily as a comment as it can an article. The important thing was that I got to say it, for I meant every word.

I hope the New Year brings you peace and joy, Emerald.

(See Mogamboguru’s Happy New Year article, comment section, for how our turkey turned out. What a disaster. Hope yours was better.)

Emerald1943
Member

Abby, I wrote you a couple of comments on the turkey! I think they are on that thread…I lose track of where I’m at sometimes! LOL

KevenSeven
Member

Here on the West Coast I get to say: HNY!

Hopeington
Member
Hopeington

Me too! I’m still up and just ushered it in with my 24 year old son.
Where are you in the West?
I’m in CA…I also wanted to say I made a mistake earlier this evening when I said it was a message at HuffPo that you wrote that led me to this site, but it was Karate Kid. Please excuse my absent mindedness.

Happy New Year, many we have many victory’s to celebrate…..
Crack the Cons 2010

KevenSeven
Member

What a buzzkil.

Not me, but KKid?

Hopeington
Member
Hopeington

Hey, at least i got the new word from ya, that means a lot to me!!

Hopeington
Member
Hopeington

Oh,I got a new word from you today…argot
Yep, had to look that one up, Thanks much, I truly learn something new everyday here.
Sleep Tight.

KevenSeven
Member

I exist, only to serve.

kesmarn
Admin

Nearly 2 a.m. here in the heartland, but I couldn’t go to bed without checking in at the Planet to wish everyone a very Happy New Year. It’s hard to believe that getting to know this group of people has made such a difference in my life in only a few months. You all feel so “real” to me even though we’ve never met. My life is so much richer because of all of you. I have–quite literally–laughed and cried while reading the posts here. The eloquence, intelligence and just plain goodness of all of you shines through every day. Thank you all. And may 2010 bring nothing but the best to the Planet and the Planeteers who make it such a comfortable and exciting place to be.

Good night (or rather early morning) to all!

escribacat
Member

Happy new year, Kesmarn. It’s just turned midnight here! The firecrackers are scaring my greyhound, Chica!

kesmarn
Admin

e’cat! Happy New Year to you, too. Hope Chica doesn’t get too spooked by the fireworks. I really loved your greyhound rescue article, btw. I think almost all of us here on the Planet are animal people, no?

Well, we may be the last two up this late, but I guess I’ll have to let you turn out the lights because I can’t keep these tired eyes open any longer!
Good night and HNY again!

Emerald1943
Member

I would like to co-sign your post, kes! This blog is fantastic and I love being with you all! Happy New Year!

kesmarn
Admin

Hi Em! Happy New Year! I’m just about to grab a quick lunch before work time. (Although I’m so incredibly lazy that I probably will take on-call today, even though it means passing up holiday pay. 😮 ) Thanks for your words of support, Em, and your wonderful sense of humor and all that you do to make the Planet orbit!

Emerald1943
Member

Thanks, kes! I don’t blame you for taking on-call! Sometimes one just has to cut themselves a little slack! Having been an ER RN, I know what you do…and it ain’t easy!

Have a good day, my friend!

kesmarn
Admin

Oh, Em, I have to hand it to you for having worked ER! That’s a tough one.
I alternate between ICU and Coronary Stepdown Units. I prefer to take care of ’em AFTER they’ve already been patched up a bit!

Let’s hope 2010 brings us some real health care reform. These patients of ours (and all the rest of us) are overdue, no?

Emerald1943
Member

Hey Kes, I LOVED the ER! It made me really stay on my toes. You have to know a lot about everything and that was a challenge to me that I seemed to need.

I also worked neuro ICU as well as immediate post-op open heart in the early days. But my favorite was ER. I have sworn to write a book about some of the experiences I had there. I loved the uncertainty of not knowing what was coming through those doors next. It certainly was NOT boring!

And don’t get me started on health care reform!! I am so disappointed at what the Senate has done with it!

KevenSeven
Member

I think we have run out of wine.

Pepe Lepew
Member

Hello. Happy New Meer. 😀

Just dropping by to say we went out to a pub to have an Irish buffet, then left early because we knew it was going to get crowded and crazy, and we were not in the mood for that — nor the drunks on the road.

About a half-mile down the road from where we live is an old grange. We’ve lived here exactly six months, and I’ve never seen that grange open except for a weekly farmer’s market in the summer. Well, tonight it was open and there were a million cars parked in the dirt parking lot and along the road, and I said, “we gotta check this out.”

It was full of mostly senior citizens, dancing to this kind of music. We stayed for about an hour. It was good fun! An old, dying building and dying culture being kept alive for one night a year.

escribacat
Member

Great story, Pepe. I love Glenn Miller.

Emerald1943
Member

Great post, Pepe! I cut my musical teeth on “Big Band” as my dad was a jazz musician. Glenn Miller, Tommy Dorsey, Duke Ellington, Lionel Hampton…what great classics!

Funny story…when I bought my first CD player some years ago, while the clerk was getting my purchase ready, I thought I had better buy a couple of discs to play. Having a rather eclectic taste, I chose a copy of Pink Floyd’s “Dark Side of the Moon” as well as Mozarts’ “Requiem Mass”. I cannot describe to you the look on that clerk’s face! It was priceless! But, as I told him, a classic is a classic! 🙂

Pepe Lepew
Member

Have you listened to Dark Side of the Moon yet to The Wizard of Oz?

FeedUp
Guest

Last night my husband and I received our New Years phone call from our dear friend from County Cork Ireland. The good
time you had last night the Irish would call it a good crack.

Hopeington
Member
Hopeington

Well I think it’s time for me to snuggle up with my bubbler and watch some Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers.
I just checked my stats and this is my 200th comment…so I thought this would be an auspicious moment to kick out the old and ring in the new…..
See you on the rise…Thank you all for restoring any semblance
of sanity I had left after this year of the right!!
Fired Up….Ready to Go
Crack The Cons 2010!!!

KQµårk 死神
Member

Thanks for your thoughtful contributions. It’s really a pet peeve of mine when other blogs don’t appreciate the contributions of all it’s members.

escribacat
Member

Good night and happy new year, Hope.

VegasBabe
Member

Hi Everyone!
Just wanted to stop in and wish everyone a very Happy New Year as well as a safe, prosperous and peaceful one!
Behave yourselves! 😉

escribacat
Member

HNY, VegasBabe.

KQµårk 死神
Member

Cheers VegasBabe! Great to hear from you for sure.

bito
Member

I hate to leave the party– but good night and A Good Year to all my friends.

Hopeington
Member
Hopeington

Thanks for all your input, I’ve thoroughly enjoyed it.
Good night and HNY!!

KQµårk 死神
Member

Goodnight bito don’t let Baku eat your good dreams.

escribacat
Member

Night bito.

Emerald1943
Member

Okay, all you beautiful PlanetPeople! I’ve spent New Years Eve with you and enjoyed every minute of it! But my laptop is over-heating and I’m about to roast from it! Time to say good night and log off!

I expect to see you all here EARLY tomorrow morning to take up the cause again! LOL A bunch of rowdy, hung-over drunks!

Have a great night all! Love to each and every one of you!

Hopeington
Member
Hopeington

And love to you too Emerald
Peace and Blessings in the coming year!!

bito
Member

Good night, Em, HNY!!

escribacat
Member

Night, Em. Happy New Year. BTW, I had to buy one of those little laptop fans for my laptop because of overheating. Works great.

Khirad
Member

I’m such a Geography nerd, yes, I did know where Mauritius was… –someone (posting on New Year’s Eve) needs a life!

The country stats were very interesting, too. One of them makes me slightly nervous. I also wonder how much the Slovenian one has to do with the choir post! That didn’t quite fit the trend! The others were fairly in line with internet usage norms. Bounce rate was amazing. Find out how many spooks visit? I believe that can be found in the stats as well.

KQµårk 死神
Member

I love cartography, I have about half a dozen globes, including and old fashion leather globe and even more maps especially old world maps and I can stare at them for hours but they got me with Mauritius.

Then again my favorite reading as a student was any World Atlas and the World Almanac.

escribacat
Member

Another map freak here. I envy you your half a dozen globes. I once saw my fantasy globe through someone’s livingroom window in a house in Mexico. It was almost the size of a volkswagon bug.

KQµårk 死神
Member

With a globe the bigger the better. The biggest one I have now is a stand along library globe but one of my favorites is a small levitating globe my wife got me for my birthday one year.

I also collect watches and Anime and cartoon cells not counting my DVDs and MP3s.

Khirad
Member

The only thing about them is they get outdated quickly. After enough years that’s collector material, but I remember being in school with globes that still had USSR on them for quite a few years…

Nevertheless, the one the size of a bug can be outdated and still be

Khirad
Member

Ditto. Reading those World atlases and almanacs also gave me an uncanny ability to recognize obscure flags (vexillology I love even more than maps). Maps really are essential to understanding the world in many ways, seeing it in 3-D, figuratively and literally (the leather one sounded intriguing). But, I imagine I’m preaching to the choir on this. 😉

I would say the only problem with Mauritius is confusing it with Mauritania. I also know about it from the curious case of the strategically important island of Diego Garcia.

KQµårk 死神
Member

I think if you love maps you have to automatically love flags as well. I guess the CIA World Fact Book has replaced the World Almanac these days in many ways.

I really love all sources of reference really.

One of my favorite reference books of all time is this book we have that opens up into a time line of great civilizations. It’s over 6 meters long and my wife and I liked it so much we used it as a border in our old bedroom.

Alas we still have a 20,000 piece puzzle we never really started that is a huge old world map.

escribacat
Member

I’m guessing I know which one you’re referring to. A good reason to use anonymous monikers, eh?