The Top Linked-To Blog Posts In 2006

Those infamous Danish cartoons, US TV channel Comedy Central's news analysis mock-up, "The Colbert Report," which orchestrated a "wikiality" check for Wikipedia, a petition by LiveJournal bloggers angry about interface changes, anti-Bush sentiment and Technorati proved to be the top blog posts of 2006, according to Nielsen Buzz Metrics this week.

From this we can we probably presume that a) you shouldn't mess with someone's space b) bloggers are largely liberal and c) they might be liberal technogeeks?

Here's hoping some comics bloggers like Steve Holland over at Bear Alley start climbing the ladder this year.

The 2007 Bloggies – your chance to vote for your favourite blog – have just started. I've nominated Bear Alley, but Joe Gordon's fab Forbidden Planet International blog topped my comics-related votes, which may sound a bit disloyal considering the amount of work I do for the other Forbidden Planet (well, Titan), but what the heck. There's plenty of comics blogs out there now – many of the links on this page such as David Bishop's Vicious Imagery is a blog, as is Doctor Who and Robin Hood writer Paul Cornell's House of Awkwardness.

Nielsen ranked the top blog posts of 2006, ranking them according to how many inbound links came their way between January and December. There were 18 blogs generating the 100 most popular posts of the year: here's the top ten:

1. 2006 Petition Against Changes in the LiveJournal Interface

2. Colbert Does the White Correspondents' Dinner

3. Keith Olbermann Delivers One Hell Of a Commentary on Rumsfeld

4. State of the Blogosphere, August 2006

5. Keith Olbermann's Special Comment on Bush: Who has left this hole in the ground? We have not forgotten, Mr. President. You have. May this country forgive you.

6. Support Denmark: Why the Forbidden Cartoons Matter

7. Saturday Night Live: If Al Gore were President

8. Milking it? (warning - graphic war images. This item has now been archived and has been superceded by a definitive report on the media coverage of the "Qana" incident on 30 July 2006)

9. State of the Blogosphere, February 2006 Part 1: On Blogosphere Growth

10. State of the Blogosphere, April 2006 Part 1 On Blogosphere Growth

Tourists ask the strangest things...

After the national press reported some of the strange questions asked of tourist offices across the country this week, including "Are there any lakes in the Lake District?", "Is Wales closed in the Winter?" and " What time of night does the Loch Ness monster surface and who feeds it?" I wondered what questions were asked of Lancaster and Morecambe's Tourism offices, and I've written a story for Virtual-Lancaster based on the response I got from our obliging Council press office, which I thought I 'd share with you as some New Year amusement.

It's clear they get their fair share of the strange, and answer them with a mix of patience and the usual forthright responses you'd expect.

The Tourist Office has details of over 300 strange questions asked in 2006, but a selection of their favourites includes "Is Morecambe north or south of Pontefract?", " Do you need a passport to go to The Isle of Man?", How do I stop my telephone bill while I’m on holiday? I live in West Yorkshire" and "Does the ferry go right into the port?" (No, it ditches you in the sea!)

Other general questions included "Is the beach open?", " Can you put me on your mailing list for shows in Manchester?" and "Have the guided walks been stopped because of the petrol shortage?"

A display by the Red Arrows in Morecambe provoked some strange questions. " When the Red Arrows come, will you be opening The Platform doors to let them in?" asked one bemused visitor, while another asked "Where will the Red Arrows be?" In the sky, hopefully - and they were, as anyone who watched the impressive show last year will recall

Major local events such as Lancaster's Fireworks Night generate plenty of questions. " What time are the fireworks?" asked one Lancaster customer. "About ten o’clock," replied the dutiful Tourist officer.

"Oh," pondered the visitor. "Is that at night?"

Morecambe's location seems to confound some visitors. Several visitors ask questions about Blackpool rather than our local seaside town, one asking for a list of Blackpool churches and tourism figures for Blackpool Pleasure Beach. One asked for a list of hotels which was immediately supplied. "Oh, great," came the enthused response. Then: "And they’re all close to Robin Hood’s Bay, are they?"

Sometimes, Tourist Information has to refer visitors to Council offices elsewhere in our area. When one tourist was advised they should visit the City Council's Arts and Events office to answer their queries, the visitor responded "Have they got a door?"

The best answer to a question I was sent has to be the response to the poser "What does the Eric Morecambe statue on the promenade weigh?"

"We he he!" replied the staff member, aping one of Eric Morecambe's famous phrases. Yes, we can just picture the blank face of the tourist who got that response.

The Tourism offices deal with thousands of visitor queries a month, so you'd expect some oddities amongst the many sensible ones. But there are some that stump even the best brains on Castle Hill or the Platform offices. One worried caller rang to ask "My catheter is leaking. What should I do?"

"Have you tried your doctor?" replied the officer, helpfully.

"Yes, but there was no reply," said the caller, "So I thought I would try you..."

Iraq in comics

Over on Slate, there's a selection of some of the best new comic books commenting on the Iraq war, including a mention for the much-talked about Web comic Shooting War by Anthony Lappé which Warner Books is publishing in 2007 as the first title in its new graphic novel line.

With statistics now suggesting the insurgency costing the US some $200 million a day to maintain its presence in Iraq - so you have to wonder how much it's costing Britain to maintain its forces in southern Iraq - the feature is a timely reminder of how what's happening in the Middle East is affecting us all on many different levels.

Slate writer Dan Klois reckons the best comics story he's read about the Iraq war is Brian Wood's DMZ, a dystopian vision of New York under siege, and it's certainly earned a host of both comics and mainstream kudos. The Chicago Sun Times described it as "addictive and brutal, and a perfect antidote to the flag-waving Fox News broadcasts of the War on Terror." Vertigo collected some of the material as DMZ: On the Ground last year and it's available from Amazon.co.uk

As with past conflicts, comics creators have offered some very different stories about the conflict, from straight-ahead embedded journalism to baldfaced military boosterism. Personally, I was impressed enough with Joe Sacco's tale of his travels through Iraq, published in The Guardian to download this 37 meg electronic version. (Strange how the Guardian has been so thoughtful about the war for so long, then does something as darn stupid as putting an image of Saddam hanged on its cover this week, a decision which deeply upset my Mum, me and countless other readers of its pages. Yet it balked at publishing the controversial Danish cartoons that caused such a storm of protest last year. Go figure!).

I've also enjoyed Brian K. Vaughan's Pride of Baghdad, re-published by Titan Books late in 2006, which did away with humans entirely, focusing on a pride of lions loose in war-torn Baghdad

A few links to strike fear into your very soul...

It's downtime, so time to see what's out there in web land... And my goodness, there's some strange stuff. Even stranger than the last time I looked.

First, one for PC fans, especially those with a professed hatred of all things Apple (which doesn't include me). Here's a wonderful comparison of the Apple Ipod vs the humble tape cassette (people over 30 will remember these, there's more than you ever wanted to know here at www.tapedeck.org). Which is better? Daniel Turek, while perhaps a Mac user himself judging from his web page address, has no doubt...




Now then. We all know that at some point over Christmas you will encounter a young child with a) a drum b) a tin whistle c) a Moog synthesiser. (Well, okay, you probably won't encounter the latter but just imagine the horror...). Simply check out this site and respond with these Air Raid Siren sounds: www.airraidsirens.com. No, really. It's almost as crazy as the Tape Deck site I mentioned above. I say almost.)

Of course, you will have to consider that ageing relatives may be thrown into blind panic by some of these sounds, suffer heart attacks as they are awoken from post Christmas dinner stupor thinking they are back in the Second World War.

We must be careful out on the Interweb. There are many strange things you can find when you have time off from the usual daily grind. Dangerous things that will make you question your own sanity far more quickly than reading the collected works of M. R. James, or perhaps the thought of albums like this ever being made...

No, I speak of course of sites such as Pet Food Labels. Beware such sites, they are evil incarnate. Still, could you live without knowing that canned dog food first appeared in the 1910s? I thought not.

Have a great Christmas everyone!