Before so much of the data bearing on site visits, links in and out, analytics, and so on were locked away from curious civilians and reserved to Facebook and various advertising companies, I would peruse my referrer logs from time to time, and learn of new friends taking interest in what I wrote, or discover that a Big Dog in the blogging world had noticed or denounced me, and which of my older posts had a lasting afterlife — that sort of thing.
Nowadays most of that information is protected, and for good enough reasons I suppose. I can see a few bits and bobs of links, but nowhere near the same hearty broth of unanticipated linkage that I remember and miss. I can see when old posts get attention; The Plural of Impetus is a long-time favourite of web searchers, and Weren’t No Kin got a visit yesterday. The dedicated, generous host of The Text This Week, Jenee Woodard, links to sermons of mine. Some of my tangles with the Episcopal Church, and more recently the Church of England, drew visits (though these hold little lasting interest). The transcript of Don Novello’s monologue (as Guido Sarducci) on UFOs has proved useful to some searchers.
I appreciate the importance of online privacy, but I miss more informative referrer logs.