Day of reckoning. I launched the website on 1st March 2014. This is seven years ago. Seven is very popular. People often pick number seven when asked to choose a number between 1 and 10. In many religions and civilisations number seven has a special position. Seven is magic. So many things count to seven. Of the first ten numbers, seven is the most prime. You cannot multiply or divide it within the group. Seven is also the number of completion. Is now a good time to complete this nonsense? The first blog entry I posted had the dramatic title "So it begins...". Since then I have posted an anniversary blog post this time every year. The second blog post (2015) had the expectantly title "So it continues...". Here, I discussed the past, present and future for the site. The third blog post (2016) had the prosaic title "And so it goes on and on and on and on and on...". Here, I did some merciless following up on ambitions and promises. The fourth blog post (2017) had the patronizing title "The necessity of content gardening". Here, I stated that a website, with proper content gardening, could live forever. The fifth blog post (2018) had the technical title "Ratchet effect through organic growth”. Here, I speculated how web indexing and algorithms drove traffic to unprecedented levels. The sixth blog post (2019) had the glorifying title "5 years and 100 000 hits". Here, I rattled off statistics lengthwise and crosswise. The seventh blog post (2020) had the dutiful title "The show must go on". Here, I concluded that the responsibilities I have towards society are too important to be calling it quits. Today, it's time again for a new blog post. The visitor counter indicates 150 601.   

Assessment

Executive summary: I have been muddling through in the time of the pandemic. The last year has been very dull due to the pandemic, but pretty good when it comes to site activity. My day job takes a lot of my time, focus and energy. Working from home isn't a good idea. At least, not for me. Work is carried out at the workplace and home is home. Fortunately, my workplace has been open almost all the time since the outbreak. All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy. However, I'm too tired to do anything on workday evenings. I do most of the site maintance on weekends. Your brain needs a rest now and then. It's relaxing to read and write about other things than work-related matters. I'm proud to say that the site has a strong focus on content. Content is king. No content, no visitors. The hard part of running a website is getting visitors to the site and then keeping them there.  

Visitor statistics

To go from zero to 150 000 visitors took 2 548 days, which is equal to seven years. Business was slow in the beginning. From zero to 10 000 took 264 days. After 50 000 visits something happened. The web indexing and Google algorithms began to kick in. The step from 50 000 to 60 000 visitors took only 131 days. The average number of days for another 10 000 visitors has since then been around 130-140. 

Department statistics

I wrote one new article last year, listed one more artist in the table, created zero new lists and wrote 26 blog entries. I also have a list of 4-5 bands waiting to be included in my prestigious article series. 

Most visited pages

The five pages below are the most visited. The order of precedence has shifted over time. The start page (Home) is and have always been the most visited page. The second page is the list "10 essential gothic country albums", which comprises a canon of must-have gothic country albums. A newcomer on the top-five list. Review of "Fossil" (Sons of Perdition collaborative album) is placed as number five. The Articles page previously held this position for four years straight in a row. It's now placed as number seven. 
 

Flaws

The website has been up and running twenty-four seven. No incidents to report. Only Russian spam bots. I don't know how they find the time and energy. I felt compelled to disconnect the YouTube module on the site since the videos are living matter. If you stumble over any obsolete or incorrect information or any dead links don't hesitate to contact me and I will fix it. I take some pride in that the website is updated. 

Reflections

I haven't received a single e-mail from market or web solutions companies where they claim earnings from the site. The site is non-profit and free of advertisment. This is the way it has been and will always be.

Future

Seven is the number of completion. Seven is also the number following six and preceding eight. Therefore, the nonsense will go on. I will go on untiringly within the limits of family, work and other duties. 

Science is organized knowledge. I like when things are organized. I like knowledge. A perfect combination. What is the reminiscence bump? It's the tendency to have increased or enhanced recollection for events, which also appears to extend to music-related memories, that occurred during adolescence and early adulthood. Previous research has revealed a consistent reminiscence bump in autobiographical memory. A new study represents one of the largest explorations of the musical reminiscence bump across adulthood to date. The researchers found a reminiscence bump in adolescence, peaking around age 14, for both ratings of the autobiographical salience of songs featured in the charts during that period and the familiarity of these songs. At last, science explained. That's why you are a sucker for the music you grew up with. The 16 albums in the image are tattooed in my mind (if you hover over the image an explanatory text with titles and artists will appear). This is what I listened to when I was 14 years old. I played them over and over again (but not so often these days). 11 of the 16 albums are live albums. Not so surprising. The golden age of live albums was the 1970's. The next topic for research: why have some of the albums aged with dignity and others not? One brutal hypothesis could be that some of the albums you listened to when you were a kid weren't that good in the first place. Further research is needed.        

Questions are never indiscreet, answers sometimes are. Existential questions are deep and philosophical questions that concern our very existence. One existential question is: Do you lend your records / CD's to others? This question was raised in a Discogs forum. The questioner wrote: "I have years ago but never again. And I'm not comfortable borrowing other folks records either. Seems too personal and intrusive. Or maybe you've borrowed friends music and never returned it?" One of the first comments hit the head of the nail: ”Frankly, I'm pretty sure my friends know better than to ask.” I agree. My policy is that I'm more than willing to burn a copy, but the original stays with me. Isn't this policy a little parsimonious? Maybe, or maybe not. In a modern and developed society there exists an implicit contract that if you lend your records to someone you expect to get it back in a certain time and in the same condition. This is the underlying theory. In practise, there's an evident risk that it will be damaged, misplaced or lost forever. Even close friends can make mistakes. My strict policy is built on expensive lessons from late adolescence. We lent and borrowed vinyls like there was no tomorrow. I borrowed from you and you borrowed from me. The lending-borrowing system wasn't foolproof. Some unscrupulous individuals could lend your vinyls to a third person. This led to unclear return responsibilities, questioned ownership and bitter disputes. We didn't know anything about treatment of vinyls. Mistreatment took place on a daily basis. Apart from the mistreatment, a huge problem was recovering what was left of your vinyls. I had a recovery rate of nearly 100 percent, since I'm both dedicated and perseverant. It could have been a brilliant career within the Enforcement Authority.  

 
Many people find it hard, awkward or embarrasing to ask someone to return an item (like a vinyl or cd) they borrowed, especially if this someone is a friend. To ask for its return may be perceived as confrontational and could damage the friendship. For me, it's the other way around. Not returning a record will most certainly damage the relationship. Time is of the essence. You have to act fast and firm. In my experience, escalation is a simple technique to use. Stick to the manual and don't waver. The first step in an escalation procedure is exhortation: "Hey, I would like to have my vinyl/cd back". You may add the word "please". If this doesn't help, the next step is confrontation. "Hey, this is not acceptable. I have asked you to return the vinyl/cd and I want it right now." If this sharper tone doesn't do the trick, the next and final step is intervention. Sometimes you have to improvise, adapt and overcome. Hard-core borrowers-procrastionists are particular difficult to deal with. They are in the second and anal stage in Sigmund Freud's theory of psychosexual development. Returning is contrary to their belief. A couple of years ago I helped a close friend to collect his beloved vinyls from a former friend after more than 15 years. I had a personal interest in the matter since I wanted to borrow some of the rarities and transfer them from vinyl to digital format. I told my friend to call his former friend and tell him that we were coming to collect them. My friend wavered: is this really socially accepted? I asked him rhetorically if borrowing records and not returning them was socially accepted. Of course, my friend had never got any further than to the first step in the escalation procedure. The intervention didn't last long and went pretty well. Some of the vinyls were in bad shape or missing. My friend let the matter pass, due to the awkward social situation but also because he didn't have full control over his record collection. Forgive and forget. Personally, I'm not that magnanimous. There's a special place in hell for people who not return vinyls/cds they have borrowed. Justice will, sooner or later, be served. And, the sooner the better.        

The American magazine Rolling Stone recently published a list of the "500 Greatest Albums of All Time". The list was originally published in 2003, with an update in 2012. For some reason it has become the most widely read and debated feature in the history of the magazine. One critic referred to the list as an example of "unrepentant rockist fogeyism". Personally, I have never cared much for Rolling Stone. It says nothing to me about my life. 500 is a large number. In fact, a ridiculous large number when it comes to lists. In this blog entry I will explain why a list of artists, bands, albums and songs never should exceed the number of 10. A bright and attentive Rolling Stone subscriber wrote in the commentary field: "Such an odd mixture of incomparable musical categories that really, it's a fools errand to even try to make a coherent list. That said, even within well defined groups that are comparable, the rankings are puzzling and seemingly arbitrary. A more interesting list would include a short statement as to why an album rose or fell 30 places from the last list in relation to another album that was also on the last list." This precise comment encompasses the three basic rules for lists: logic, consistence and level of originality. It seems like the staff of Rolling Stone missed that memo or consciously broke protocol (involved advocacy groups(!), used gross lists and allowed votes). "Shit in, shit out", the concept that flawed, or nonsense input data produces nonsense output is applicable in this case. Here's my bill of indictment. First of all, absence of logic. The unit of measurement must be accurately defined. The Rolling Stone list deals with the concept of "greatest". This is all very well, but "greatest" in what sense (commercially, artistically or some other aspect)? There must be a logical explanation to why no. 333 on the list Bill Withers "Still Bill" (1972) is greater than no. 334 Santana "Abraxas" (1970)? If it may as well be the other way around, you are out of your depth. The Rolling Stone list is equal to when an untrained student begins to write an essay without disposition, goal and meaning. Secondly, lack of consistence. A list must stand the test of pairwise comparison. This is a good way to determine how to access alternatives by providing an easy way to rate and rank decision-making. Not only must no. 333 on the list be greater than no. 334. The procedure will have to be repeated from the beginning, comparing no. 1 to no. 334, no. 2 to no. 334, no. 3 to no. 334, all the way up to no. 333. This is combinatorics. If the pairwise comparison test fail, you will have to start all over again. Pairwise comparison is a reliable method, but very time-consuming. Maybe, this is an area for machine learning in artificial intelligence. On the other hand, humans are complex. Thirdly, inadequacies in level of originality. A list should be unique. Copyright law and lists of artists, bands, albums and songs both require that a work must be original to the author, which means it must be independently created and possess at least some minimal degree of creativity. The Rolling Stone list doesn't meet one of these basic requirements. It's an impersonal concotion without an originator. And, last but not least, why should a list never exceed the number of 10? The answer is this. Logic, consistence and level of originality are perspicuous, controllable and manageable. This isn't a complicated theory. It's just good practice. I learned it the hard way. 

Absolute zero is the lowest limit of the temperature scale, −273.15° on the Celsius scale −459.67° on the Fahrenheit scale. At absolute zero, all motion comes to a standstill. This pretty much sums up the impact of covid-19. One of the early victims of the pandemic was Atlas Records, read more here (opens in a new window). A month ago, I took a walk along S:t Eriksgatan in Stockholm, the former hub for second hand record stores in Northern Europe. I walked past one of the few remaining (?) and also best store, Skivbörsen, located at S:t Eriksgatan 71. The store has been closed since March 2020 due to covid-19. It's a wonderful establishment for cds and vinyls. Skivbörsen gives the concept of chaos a new and deeper meaning. However, the supply is unmatched and prices are very moderate. A hand-written note on the entrance door. Closed until further notice. The modest shop lighting is still on. I took the photo through the storefront. A lot of vinyls on the counter in their protective sleeves. It seems like the owner was handling them and then suddenly decided to evacuate. I came to think of the Chernobyl disaster, the nuclear accident on 26 April 1986 near the city of Pripyat in Ukraine. Pripyat was not evacuated until the day after, approximately 36 hours after the initial blast. The evacuation of 47 000 inhabitants, in 1 200 buses and 200 trucks, took only a few hours. Initially it was decided to evacuate the population for three days; later this was made permanent. Nowadays, you can go there on guided tours. The phenomenon is called disaster tourism. It has been defined as the practice of visiting locations at which an environmental disaster, either natural or man-made, has occurred. It's a ghost town. Cracked concrete buildings, abandoned apartments, peeling wallpaper, moldy daycares and the never opened Ferris wheel located in the Pripyat amusement park. The Azure swimming pool and Avanhard stadium are two other notable tourist attractions. Urban explorers find decay of uninhabited space profoundly beautiful. I don't think Stockholm will decay, but maybe change. I can already detect small changes in the streetscape: clearance sales, bankruptcies and vacant business premises. For many years we have been visiting second hand record stores. Not so much anymore. Is this delight over now?