Thanks for 500,000 visits

Posted 13 April 2005 by Jack Krebs

↗ The current version of this post is on the live site: https://pandasthumb.org/archives/2005/04/thanks-for-5000.html

Sometime this morning the Panda’s Thumb received its 500,000 visit, according to our site meter.

I just would like to offer my thanks to our many visitors. I really appreciate the many thoughtful comments people offer. Both the breadth and depth of my perspective have grown by being a part of (often just as a lurker) the converstaions here.

Everyone should have a round of your favorite Panda’s Thumb digital beverage on me. :-)

19 Comments

Wesley R. Elsberry · 13 April 2005

Current Alexa ranks:

PT: 106,155
talkorigins.org: 51,643
DI: 159,018
ARN: 194,073
ISCID: 827,119
designinference.com: 780,785

I'm very pleased that PT has become so popular a stop for readers in the short time since the site's creation.

Russell · 13 April 2005

I'm not up on Alexa ranks. Should I look at those like golf scores or basketball scores?

sir_toejam · 13 April 2005

Congrats!

might i suggest, now that PT has attained significant traffic, that an improvement to the site to better handle the increase in traffic is warranted?

I often experience slowness, server failures, post failures, and even just a plain old lack of being able to load up the site at all.

cheers

Wesley R. Elsberry · 13 April 2005

Golf scores. Alexa's #1 would be their pick of the highest traffic site on the 'net.

Wesley R. Elsberry · 13 April 2005

Server failures? I don't think so. We have had an ongoing issue with the commercial ISP provider. And, lo, we're hooking up a different ISP this week to try it out. If that looks better than the current service, we will switch over.

sir_toejam · 13 April 2005

uh yeah, server failure. i actually sent an email to the admin detailing a server error either yesterday or the day before, in fact, and a couple of others noted it in some of the threads. should i dig those out?

as in getting a white screen which says server error, please report to administrator.

or is that not a server error?

i guess it doesn't happen that often; but it did happen.

cheers

fwiffo · 13 April 2005

Putting the following in your Mozilla userContent.css will speed up PT noticeably if you have a less than speedy computer:
body { background-attachment: scroll !important; }

sir_toejam · 13 April 2005

hmm. i'll give that a shot.

thanks.

cheers

"Rev Dr" Lenny Flank · 13 April 2005

Posted by Jack Krebs on April 13, 2005 12:18 PM Sometime this morning the Panda's Thumb received its 500,000 visit, according to our site meter. I just would like to offer my thanks to our many visitors.

Let me post something I just said over at t.o., that seems appropriate to repeat here: *We* here on the group have the luxury of ridiculing the ID morons in Dover and Kansas from long-distance. We are hundreds or thousands of miles away and they are nothing to us but words on a computer screen. The same, however, is NOT true for people such as the plaintiffs in the Dover lawsuit or the Kansas organizers, who have to face vituperative venom from the people AROUND them every day --- everyone from the checkout girl at the supermarket to the guy who delivers their pizzas. It takes an awful lot of courage to carry through in that sort of atmosphere. Sadly, the step from "talking" to "doing" is a very large one (TOO large, for most people). The people in these cases *have* done it, and are paying an extremely high price for it, much higher than perhaps many of us might realize. So next time someone tells you that they "don't have the time to get involved", or "don't have the money to spare", or whatever other excuse they have for talking the talk and not walking the walk, think of those everyday folks in Dover and Kansas who DID have the ping-pongs to get involved and fight for the rest of us. The Dover plaintiffs, and the Kansas organizers, and everyone like them, deserve every scintilla of praise, support, encouragement, and help that we can give them. They all have balls of solid steel, and I salute them. Every one.

sir_toejam · 13 April 2005

er Speaking of balls of steel, or balls of blue, in any case, I will be posting a brief summary of a proposal to form an "evolution ngo" whose function will be to provide assistance and resources to local communities and teachers who feel they are drowning in the sea of ignorance out there. I expect i will be done with it by eod friday.

Just quickly, the idea is to recruit college students and others to "give back" to their communities; to act as a warm body resource that can be available to give talks at schools and public groups in order to assist in general education, which seems to be so lacking in many communities.

I will post in a forum i created on google:

http://groups-beta.google.com/groups/adult_confirm?_done=/group/evolution-ngo

which is public, so anyone can join in.

I am hoping that a fully fleshed out proposal will be forthcoming after input, and some of us here might get on board to make it work. I already have one person who has agreed to write up a formal funding proposal, and we will need others to suggest possible board members, etc.

cheers

Jack Krebs · 13 April 2005

Thanks, Lenny. I have passed on your comments to the KCFS Board.

But don't underestimate the value of support from people who are not in the front lines at this particular time. All of us gain motivation by knowing there are others who share our concerns and are rooting us on.

And, as I have said a number of times, it could be your backyard next time. Kansas Citizens for Science were one of the first activist groups to tackle the ID movement. Now what goes around comes around, and they have returned. We learned lots of things by watching our colleagues in Ohio and New Mexico and elsewhere, and hopefully people will learn by watching us.

Mike Hopkins · 13 April 2005

Current Alexa ranks: PT: 106,155 talkorigins.org: 51,643 DI: 159,018 ARN: 194,073 ISCID: 827,119 designinference.com: 780,785 I'm very pleased that PT has become so popular a stop for readers in the short time since the site's creation.
— Wesley

The anti-evolutionists are a bit more spread out so it makes them seem a less popular than they really are. Lest anyone doubt that the YECs are still a major force in anti-evolution: AiG: 27,712 (AiG is kicking you know what in this regard) ICR: 112,004 CRS: 733,906 Hovind: 234,782 Brown: 379,510 True.Origin: 658,341 This one is far more than mere YEC nonsense, but it has a lot of AiG materials: Christian-Answers.net: 13,985 The OEC Reasons to Believe is 209,648. For our side, the NCSE is 351,392. -- Anti-spam: Replace "user" with "harlequin2"

jay boilswater · 13 April 2005

And thank you for providing this great website!

sir_toejam · 13 April 2005

ditto

Wesley R. Elsberry · 14 April 2005

PT has concentrated on responses to ID claims, which is why I collected the ID site info. The point is well taken that in general, YEC is a much larger movement than ID, with corresponding web traffic. ID advocates do all they can to co-opt the block of YECs out there, for that is their power base.

Wesley R. Elsberry · 14 April 2005

More testing.

Henry J · 14 April 2005

Did it pass the test? :)

Bayesian Bouffant, FCD · 15 April 2005

The anti-evolutionists are a bit more spread out so it makes them seem a less popular than they really are.
— Mike Hopkins

Oh, my! You wouldn't suggest lumping the Intelligent Design Creationists together with the other Creationists, would you? I don't think they would like that. Your comment highlights the fact that the various anti-evolution groups are united only in what they stand against, not in any coherent agreement of what they stand for.

sir_toejam · 15 April 2005

i wouldn't use the word "coherent" in any sentence that also included "ID". it is simply not part of the mindset.