New Media

In case anyone was wondering as to the result of the Vancouver Blogger SEO experiment, here they are:

Before I blogged this post at 11:38 pm on January 24, Currents wasn’t even on the first six pages when searching for the phrase “Vancouver blogger” (I just stopped looking after page six, since I was somewhat depressed that after three years of blogging, my site just wasn’t making the cut).

As of 10:15 pm on January 25, Currents (well, Jonathon Narvey, anyway – I’m not sure why my blog title isn’t getting picked up) is ranked number 5 on page 1 for Yahoo searches for “Vancouver blogger”. I’m just behind Urban Vancouver (#1, good for you!), the Vancouver blogger meetup group, Pacific IT’s interview with Alphablogs expert blogging consultant Isabella Mori, and uberblogger/marketing guru Darren Barefoot (who really ought to be disqualified, since he spends most of his time jet-setting in Europe. Ah, well, he’s here in spirit).

Following close behind Currents at #6 is superstar entrepreneur and all around nice guy John Chow’s post about meeting with the rest of the Vancouver blogger gang. Take that, John! You may make more money in a month from blogging than some people make in a year, but… um, hmmmm, where was I going with this? Oh, right, if you want to learn how to make serious money from blogging while being an all around nice guy, check out johnchow.com

But in regard to the SEO experiment, it appears good old keywords really do the trick. Who knew?

In any case, it’s nice to be on the first page for a day. It probably won’t last, but at least I can now say I’ve been there. Cheers, loyal Currents readers.

Beyond Robson Vancouver blogger Sean Orr and I aren’t exactly best buds. We’ve certainly had our, um, differences of opinion.

But I was sorry to see a fair number of Vancouver blogosphere blogger trolls kicking him in the nuts this week in the comments section. I’m coming a little late to the discussion, since I was so busy with work stuff that the Vancouver blogosphere and Vancouver bloggers haven’t gotten a whole lot of time from me lately. But the whole “ESL students may or may not be cool and therefore I must be a xenophobe” thing is such a red herring. Take issue with Orr’s negative vibes if you like, Vancouver bloggers (keeping in mind that he’s hardly the first Vancouver blogger pessimist to publish online), but let’s not throw out spurious aspersions.

By the way, to any Vancouver blogger who visit this site today, please note that as an SEO experiment, I have inserted the phrase, Vancouver blogger, a whole shwack of times just to see if a single post can draw in significant Google ranking for search terms to a blog that is otherwise not always entirely dedicated to the comings and goings of Vancouver bloggers. Feel free to post comments or links to this post including “Vancouver blogger” and we’ll see in the next 48 hours just how effective good old keywords are; by that, I mean the keywords inserted knowingly by a Vancouver blogger.

Taking a page out of Vancouver uber-blogger Miss604‘s playbook, here’s what’s going on around our gleaming city at the edge of the world:

Marketing Ruined My Life’s Jeremy Lim serves up a classic burger… commercial.

Media maven Michael Klassen on Barack Obama (well, on a link to Barrack, anyway).

Carol Browne tells us it’s the Year of the Rat (a year late, according to one commenter). This is actually a good thing, apparently.

Sean Orr takes pity – sort of – on guilty Vancouver cop. Who knew Morning Brew’s author was such a softie? He must have written this before actually quaffing his morning brew of broken glass and dry roast. Sean, you’re all heart.

John Bollwitt has located a new copyright widget for RSS feeds. All of us west coast geeks are grateful.

Covenant Zone’s peeps are proud to be Canadian. Free Ezra!

Wired Cola introduces Charlie the Cockatoo. Um, yeah.

And of course, Miss604 and a host of other Vancouver bloggers will be flying to Toronto without me because the CBC just forgot to call. I have to keep telling myself that.

Clearly, Vancouver’s blogging community is an eclectic and diverse bunch.

Currents has overcome two frustrating blogging platform changes, ferocious bouts of writers’ block and an occasional hangover to bring our readers riveting posts guided by hard-boiled realpolitik, Canadian pragmatism with an ironic sense of humor. Here’s the best of 2007.

Vancouver Indymedia shuts down, no doubt due to a Zionist conspiracy. (January)

Albertans decide they need oil more than water. Bottoms up! (February)

Urban sprawl vs. Ecodensity (March)

Vancouver-area Green Party candidate commits political suicide (April)

Anti-Poverty Committee decides to pursue politics by other means (May)

Making First Nations Poverty History… eventually. (June)

Black gold found!… in Burnaby? (July)

Obscure Vancouver writer finishes novel in three days. (August)

Vancouver City Hall strike drags on… and on… (September)

The masks are coming off the stooges. (October)

Raven and Jason and life in Vancouver’s DTES (November)

An assassin ends the year with a shot heard round the world. (December)

Keep reading! The good part’s coming up…

As loyal Currents readers may have noticed, the title of each recent post on Currents is now preceded by a category name.

While Currents is a Vancouver writer’s take on current affairs, politics and life on Canada’s west coast, that list of topics can encompass a pretty nebulous (AKA confusing) array of subjects. The new categories should help our readership quickly figure out the topic of the latest post (and whether or not they might want to read it).

CityView:Comment on Vancouver City Hall, local news and municipal shenanigans
WorldView: Perspectives on current affairs and global hotspots
Globe&Post: Canadian issues, politics and argument
EcoView: Environmental news and green views
Vlog: A video blog post, just for the hell of it
PhotoBlog: Featured image of the week
BlogRant: The technical hurdles and small victories of getting a blog to function properly
TrueNorth: Activism and punditry from Canadians fighting fascism, demagogues and unrepentant jerks
WriteImage: The business of writing, marketing and media manipulation
MyLife:This writer’s personal milestones and speed bumps

Excelsior!

UPDATE: Thanks to new media maven Michael Klassen of Thinking Cap Inc. for some very helpful support in getting this site working properly. The intricacies of RSS feeds and HTML may give others pause, but Thinking Cap’s el presidente himself was on hand to get everything working properly with step-by-step assistance. Now that Currents’ Feedburner feed does what it is supposed to do, this writer can actually get to the essential work of winning more subscribers…

Speaking of which, if you’re curious about how to subscribe to Currents, try clicking on the giant orange button in the top right corner (or the little orange button in your web browser bar). Subscribing only takes a few seconds, and it’s totally painless.