Goodbye, Mark

by Scott McLeod | Jan 17, 2011 | Blogging | 22 comments

Goodbye, Mark.

I don’t say this lightly. I am an extremely strong advocate for free speech and for open discussion. In 4+ years – and despite numerous wide-ranging and contentious dialogues here at this blog (many of them sparked by my own stupid statements) – until today I have never blocked or deleted a non-spam comment or commenter. But you are now the first person I have blocked as a commenter. Here’s why…

You’re mean, you’re arrogant, and you’re rude. You go out of your way to belittle others and, for some reason, you’ve decided that my blog is the place to spew your invecture. I’ve received numerous private e-mails about your online behavior and I’ve read far too many of your personal insults. I’ve repeatedly asked for civility from you and you’ve just masked your vituperation with more-generalized ad hominem attacks which fool no one. By all definitions, you’re an Internet troll.

Most importantly, however, I’ve watched many of my readers try to engage with you. Folks I really respect have tried desperately to have meaningful, productive dialogues with you. All to no avail. So, forced to choose between you and the members of my learning community, I pick them. Hands down.

It shouldn’t have taken me so long to decide this. Torn between my deeply-held convictions about open dialogue and my unease with your comments, I defaulted toward openness and discussion. But Bill’s recent statement resonated deeply with me and helped me realize that it’s time to put a stop to you:

I’m tired of seeing your unproductive angst and negative personal attacks in the places where I’m trying to learn.

I want to give people a platform for dissent. I believe strongly in the Hegelian dialectic. But in the end it’s my blog. It’s my party. It’s my and my readers’ learning community and you’re the jerk that’s ruining it. You’ve redirected too much of our time and energy in nonproductive directions. You’ve contributed nothing to our learning and I’m pretty certain that you’ve caused other of my readers to disengage. You’re an energy suck, a psychic vampire. I’m tired of it and I’m tired of you. You can have your own community and be as vile and mean-spirited and righteous as you like. But not here. Not anymore.

Go spit your vitriol somewhere else. Goodbye and good riddance. Oh, and for the record, I feel deep pain for the students whom you supposedly serve and for whom you have so little regard.

Image credit: goodbye

The year in review: Some year-end blog stats for 2010

by Scott McLeod | Jan 2, 2011 | Blogging | 0 comments

Well, 2010 is over; hope it was a good one for you. For those who may be interested, here are a few statistics about this blog from the past year…

Overview stats

• 24,887 Feedburner subscribers (plus another 886 e-mail subscribers)
• 268,975 visits
• 177,437 unique visitors (64.64% were new visitors)
• 491,102 pageviews
• 152,999 Compete traffic rank
• 153,974 Alexa traffic rank (USA)
• 393,504 Alexa traffic rank (global)
• 20 PostRank Education
• 5 Google PageRank

2010 posts that had the most unique pageviews last year

1. Tools for school – Digital document annotation on an iPad, iPod Touch, or laptop (5,218)
2. If we were really serious about educational technology (4,682)
3. 12 videos to spark educators’ thinking (4,562)
4. We can’t let educators off the hook (3,097)
5. Videos – I hate my teacher (2,828)

Earlier posts that had the most unique pageviews last year

1. Video – Did You Know? 4.0 (8,200)
2. Don’t teach your kids this stuff. Please? (4,601)
3. Bolman & Deal frameworks (4,193)
4. Gone Fischin’ (2,813)
5. Top 20 TED Talks podcasts for busy school administrators (2,769)

2010 posts that generated the most comments

1. We can’t let educators off the hook (139)
2. Should students be allowed to use cell phones on all assignments and assessments? (82)
3. Educators need learning advocacy, not technology advocacy (72)
4. If we were really serious about educational technology (64)
5. Why don’t we care about the Hindu kid? Or the Jewish employee? (62)

2010 posts that were shared the most on Twitter

1. If we were really serious about educational technology (352)
2. 12 videos to spark educators’ thinking (316)
3. Calling all bloggers! – Leadership Day 2010 (249)
4. We spend 80% of our classroom time on the skills needed for 10% of our jobs (153)
5. We can’t let educators off the hook (143)

2010 posts that were shared the most on Facebook

1. If we were really serious about educational technology (222)
2. We spend 80% of our classroom time on the skills needed for 10% of our jobs (78)
3. Video – Race to Nowhere trailer (54)
4. We can’t let educators off the hook (53)
5. Struggling with your dissertation? and Reclaiming the language [guest post] (50, tie)

Visitors who left the most comments (not including those who didn’t leave their full names)

1. Mark Hauck
2. Jerrid Kruse
3. Carl Anderson
4. Russ Goerend
5. Gary Stager

I’m big in… (countries)

1. United States
2. Canada
3. United Kingdom
4. Australia
5. India

I’m big in… (cities)

1. New York
2. Sydney
3. Chicago
4. London
5. Minneapolis

Top traffic sources

1. Google / organic (23%)
2. Direct (22%)
3. Feedburner (11%)
4. Google / referral (4%)
5. Twitter (3%)

Browsers used by visitors

1. Firefox (35%)
2. Internet Explorer (31%)
3. Safari (17%)
4. Chrome (12%)
5. Other (5%)

Operating systems used by visitors

1. Windows
2. Macintosh
3. iPhone
4. iPad
5. Linux

It was a great year for me on the blog front. Thanks, everyone, for being loyal readers, active commenters, and helpful co-creators and sharers!

[oh, and check out Mind Dump; you might like that too!]

Most popular posts – October 2010

by Scott McLeod | Nov 3, 2010 | Blogging | 0 comments

These posts got the most web traffic on my two blogs in October 2010:

Dangerously Irrelevant

1. Videos – I hate my teacher
2. 12 videos to spark educators’ thinking
3. We can’t let educators off the hook
4. Will libraries still exist?
5. What I ask of SLA teachers [guest post]
6. How much math do you really need in everyday life?
7. Video – Did You Know? 4.0
8. What are our excuses, again, for not putting computers in the hands of our children?
9. Tools for school – Digital document annotation on an iPad, iPod Touch, or laptop
10. Bolman & Deal frameworks

Mind Dump

1. There’s a thin line between words and wounds
2. Only a rich white person would say something this stupid?
3. The most illiterate discussion ever regarding student learning?
4. Don’t hold grudges
5. When you argue with an idiot
6. It’s no wonder school-age students are still lugging home pounds of textbooks
7. Not a single suggestion for improving my teaching. Ever.
8. Steven Weber: Would I want my child in this classroom?
9. The Daily Show takes on the education crisis
10. America throws out some of the best innovators in the world

Be a courageous edublogger

by Scott McLeod | Oct 1, 2010 | Blogging | 4 comments

Miguel Guhlin had an awesome post yesterday about being a courageous edublogger. Here are a couple of quotes:

I have found that discussing some topics usually ruffle feathers of those who fear free speech, openness and transparency. It’s as if by silencing others, they will eliminate the threat represented. Yet, if sharing ideas and information is the threat, then human beings will never be safe.

AND

What if what we need in education are more bloggers, unafraid to ask the hard questions and ruffle the feathers of those who, like career politicians, appear smooth as an oil slick in the Gulf?

Happy reading! (oh, and Miguel’s the one on the left)