The good news: Yesterday, I got linked from Instapundit twice! Since the purpose of a blog is to communicate, this means a big bump in daily visit statistics!
The bad new: Yesterday, I got linked from Instapundit twice! The increased traffic displayed, yet again, how creaky and unreliable BlueHost’s services have become.
Pretty much every time I’m linked from Instapundit, people complain “Oh, we killed Lawrence’s server again!” Variegated 404, 500 and Site Unavailable errors abound.
Every time I point out to BlueHost that they seem to be running my blog on a severely resource-constrained server (most likely a virtual cloud server of some sort, time-shared with a whole bunch of other websites/blogs), they always go “Well, it’s not our problem! Your site is just too unoptimized!” and point me to gtmetrix. Evidently embedded Tweets use up a huge number of resources, which makes me wonder why Twitchy doesn’t seem to have these problems at much higher loads.
Keep in mind that I’m running an old stock version of WordPress, with the bare minimum of necessary plugins (like AntispamBee) with BlueHost’s stock tools. So it’s not like I’m doing something wacky and unorthodox.
When I mention these problems on Twitter, other hosting companies come out of the woodwork and say “Yeah, you could improve some things, but there’s no reason for BlueHost to suck so bad.”
To improve speed, I’m looking at several different cache plugins for WordPress, including:
All are rated between four to five stars, all have a majority of users who say “Wow, this really sped up my site,” and all have a small number of reviewers who say “Agggggh, this trashed my site! Stay far away!”
If you’re a WordPress blogger reading this, let me know if you have experience with any of those and how well the worked for you.
I just did a manual backup of my WordPress database, but I should probably install some sort of backup plugin as well. Here’s another area WordPress users can tell me what works best for them.
During Instalanches, some worried whether I’d been deplatformed, since WordPress is evidently kicking Conservative Treehouse off their platform. The answer is no, it’s just BlueHost sucking, and the Treehouse guys get a lot more traffic than I do. I’m sure I would be irritating enough to deplatform if Big Tech were more aware of me, but right now I seem to enjoy security through obscurity.
Some have asked whether they can donate to get me a new server. While that would be swell (and see the donation button below), my immediate preference would be for BlueHost to stop sucking so I don’t have to go through the pain of transferring my blog to a new provider.
BattleSwarm is, at best, a break-even proposition for me, after donations and Amazon affiliate links are factored in, specially since I haven’t let anyone put their crappy adware on my site. For several years now, I’ve managed to put up a blog post every single day. I started blogging due to outrage during the Obama Administration (and because Dwight took the plunge first), and if Biden manages to make his stolen election stick, I certainly don’t see less reason to blog. But it would be nice to get paid more for it.
In the past I’ve done the occasional piece in places like National Review or Reason, but I’m not sure any of the legacy paying outlets is a good fit or substitute for regular blogging. (And I’m sure as hell not going to write for a sadness factory like The Bulwark.) Ideally I could get paid to contribute to a multi-contributor blog like Instapundit or Legal Insurrection, or some site like Empower Texans. But thus far no one has asked me to contribute to such.
I don’t ask for donations as much as some blogs because financially I’m doing fine, and technical writing pays well. (Between my house, library and various 401Ks, I’m probably an Almost Millionaire in net worth.) (Maybe I’ll even get enough to move off the default WordPress theme.) But I didn’t get into blogging to get rich, much like one doesn’t become a Trappist monk for the kinky sex and hard drugs.
Alas, I’m being laid off from my current technical writing job in December. So maybe I should ask for more donations. But I have the sort of skill sets (documenting programming APIs, among many other things) that’s very much in demand, so I don’t expect to be unemployed long. Plus I have another small income stream in the book business. There other Vast Right Wing Bloggers out there much more in need of donations than I.
So, that’s sort of my State of the Blog roundup. I’m still here and I don’t plan on going anywhere.
Tags: blogging, BlueHost, Instapundit, Site Administration
I’m sure you don’t need another competitor, but I’m curious: how does one get started in technical writing?
Back when I got started, using computers and knowing how to write was the only criteria to get started. Today, they usually like you to have some sort of vaguely related degree (English, computer science, journalism, etc.) and at least some technical skills (knowledge of Linux and at least some programming skills are a good start). You can also get started if you’re can write and are already in tech in a related field (support, QA, marketing, etc.).
You might take a gander at what Space City Weather did to host his own site. I don’t know how techie you want to be, but throwing together a basic wordpress hosting site and then proxying it out via cloudflare or similar shouldn’t be too bad.
Here is the article: https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2017/09/how-to-hurricane-proof-a-web-server/
I’ve been working with self-hosted WordPress sites for a long time.
First, you can do better than Blue Host and possibly cheaper too. Blue Host had been absorbed into the Endurance International Group “family” of webhosts. Look for something not in that group. I use BigScoots.com and think they’re terrific.
Second, consider Updraft for your backups and save them to the Amazon S3 servers–or somewhere offsite. Amazon is a small pain to get set up but the storage space is cheap and reliable.
Allow me to preface this by saying that I’m not shilling for my services here.
I’m no expert on WordPress, though I have worked with plenty of those sites. If your host is not impressing you, then I’d look at alternatives. I personally use Hosting Matters, and their support is excellent. It might be worth it to talk with them about moving your WordPress site to them.
I have a reseller account with Hosting Matters, and can get you lower-than-retail monthly pricing on their unmetered hosting. Details here: https://hostmatters.com/web-hosting/unmetered-plan/
Alternatively, there are WordPress-specific hosting companies out there, but it will likely cost a bit more per month.
As far as backup is concerned, I’d regularly back it up to a local NAS at your home, and back that up to offsite storage like BackBlaze B2.
Hi there –
You don’t know me (or at least, I don’t think you do!), so a few quick introductory facts:
– 60 year old white guy, lifelong libertarian, now lives in Nevada;
– Worked for libertarian think tanks for 25 years as a writer/editor/director of persuasive public policy documents, including
o Reason Foundation, AEI, Fraser Institute (Canada), Pacific Research Institute, Georgia Public Policy Institute, Texas Public Policy Institute
o Published extensively in most formats, from op-eds to white papers and non-fiction books on science and policy
o Web catalogue: http://www.kennethpgreen.com
– BS and MS Biology, Doctorate Environmental science/engineering
Now looking to transition solely to freelance, but shift my basic income generation from policy writing (where funding has dried up) to technical writing in Biology, Environment, Health, and Safety, primarily, as that’s where my credentials/specialized knowledge resides.
My problem is that I’ve been an institutional player for decades, so don’t know where to go to find freelance work of this sort in any reliable way; and some of the things that are now considered technical writing are a lot more like programming, so I will need to build/freshen up on those skills.
Questions!
1) Can you (or are you willing to) help me out with some advice, as you seem to have mastered that whole “technical writing as an income base” thing? If so…
a. Tips on finding/landing the work?
b. Specific skillsets in terms of programs I need to master? You mention APIs here: https://www.battleswarmblog.com/?p=46405. I’ve seen mention of others such as Sharepoint (I’m familiar with that one), but also other technical formats that I’m not familiar with.
I’ll be glad to kick you a commission when/if I start landing the work based on your advice!
Best,
Ken
————————————-
Kenneth P. Green, D.Env.
Henderson, NV 89052
A few bits of possible useful advice:
1. Biology, Environment, Health, and Safety are all good areas to look at, but it’s going to be tougher to find them locally where you are, and even today, when you’re first starting out in a field, they generally want to work onsite (even today). After you have more experience in a job then they’ll trust you for fulltime remote.
2. With a policy background, it would probably be best to start looking at jobs that fall under the “Business Analyst” label. Policies, procedures, RFPs, competitive analysis, and regulatory compliance docs. Indeed, with your degree and background, you could probably get a good look for jobs that require regulatory compliance docs as the biggest component.
3. API documentation is not something you jump into unless you already have some sort of exposure to documenting software and programming tools. Maybe look at that after you’ve mastered some basic online programming courses. (There are a lot of free ones out there.)
4. Sharepoint is a sort of lowest common denominator tool, because Microsoft throws it in as a freebie on so many deals. That said, the sort of companies that do regulatory compliance probably use it a lot. (Be sure to put every remotely applicable software tool you’ve ever used on your resume, include all the MS office components, as those are sort of the bare minimum for just about any writing job today.)
5. Be sure to put down any statistical analysis experience, that’s another useful skill.
6. Look on Indeed and LinkedIn for business analyst and technical writing jobs, to see what sort of skills they’re looking for. See what the ads there are asking for.
7. If you have little experience, temp and contract agencies can help you get your foot in the door.
Hope this helps!
here you go, try this theme update:
https://pearsonified.com/
–> https://pearsonified.com/projects/focus/
I have a couple of tiny blogs (Walking Creek World, and Hillbilly at Harvard) created using free WordPress.com. They’re not remotely big enough to attract attention, but WordPress dumping the Conservative Treehouse has me concerned. I’m wondering what comparably simple and free, or almost free, alternatives are out there, ideally companies not anti-conservative. I’ve seen lists of ‘alternatives to WordPress’, but they do not mention politics.
The advantage of free WordPress is that you don’t need a lot of technical knowledge to set up a blog (although their WYSIWYG editing software was clunky, and now has been replaced with some kind of ‘block’ editing that I find inscrutable). So I’d like to maintain that relative ease, if possible.
Suggestions welcome.
WordPress’ new block editor is indeed absolutely horrible. I installed the Classic Editor so I don’t have to deal with it.
More chaos coming? WordPress.com (the host) and Mail Chimp are getting into the “de-platforming” game.
https://legalinsurrection.com/2020/11/prepare-for-the-great-decoupling-deplatforming-moves-downstream-to-wordpress-com-and-mailchimp/