God, the things you have to do if you want to blog!
When you first start, you think the blog program itself is enough for you. It formats your entries, automatically archives them, and allows readers to add comments. The package looks professional and slick . . . but it’s not really yours, is it? It looks like a thousand other basic blogs, so you learn how to change headers, modify formats, make it your own. But before you stick your finger in the works, you have to learn how to back up what you have, in case you screw up, and that forces you to learn about databases.
Then you learn about human spammers, who find your blog and add comments filled with links to online casinos, and you have to learn about spam-catcher programs and how to install and manage them. Then you learn that if you periodically back up your databases but fail to remove old backups, you run out of server space, so you have to learn how to manage that.
And then you learn about these guys:
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Bots. Goddamn bots, signing up with computer-generated usernames and posting meaningless comments like “Tell me more” or “I respectfully disagree,” each containing links to boner pill sites. You learn that spambots don’t care that your blog is read by 100, maybe 200 people in the whole world . . . it’s just another platform for their links, and once they’ve found you they tell their spambot friends and now they come in hoards, swamping your site to the extent that you exceed your bandwidth limits and no one can read your blog because it’s down, and you have to whisper sweet nothings in your server administrator’s ear so he’ll bump up your bandwidth limit.
Now you have to strip off your shirt and fight the bots.
Not to mix metaphors or anything, but the blogosphere is a jungle. I knew that going in, but I thought I could maybe stay in the Land Rover and see the giraffes from a distance, like a tourist. Nope. You can’t stay in the Land Rover. You have to get out and fight off vultures, hyenas, jackals . . . and bots. Hand to hand, baby!