The Oil Drum Celebrates 3M unique visits and 8M page views
Posted by Prof. Goose on October 31, 2006 - 8:01pm
It's funny, with each milestone I seem to make my lauds shorter--when in all actuality, you all have accomplished more and more. The people who make this site work are just wonderful, well-intentioned, and just damned smart. You, the community, thank you for being so much a part of this and for making our little corner stoop one of the best and most informative sites in the 'sphere. I learn from this site every day; and I hope that we continue to improve while maintaining the high standards of discourse and evidence that TOD is increasingly known for.
If you have ideas--we have some innovations that we will bringing to fruition over the next few weeks--but we could always use more ideas--email us!
Also, right now, we're making this all work with advertisements (however, we would entertain moving to a worldchanging (funded by a foundation/benevolent souls) type model at some point as well), so please, when you see a post that you think your friends would like, spread the word, get the author as many eyeballs as you think they deserve.
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- Content: editors at theoildrum dot com
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Anyone from the NYC area that's interested in doing guest posts, please contact me.
Anyway, I want to add to the chorus of praise and thanks to all the contributors who make this such a priceless resource.
Congratulations on your traffic, and thanks for the invaluable service!
I'm trying to figure out when we came on-line and when I wrote my first comment. The rest, as they say, is history.... I don't even remember how I stumbled across TOD, you and HO, or what made me start talking...
As Jim Kunstler says, It's All Good...
Thanks to our community, we are the best on the internets and using The Google, we will continue to be so... As ASPO-USA said, stand up and take a bow, all of you, because you deserve it ... I also learn something here everyday... and don't be shy if you have something to say or have a question to ask. Nobody has all the answers but we're working on it!
and HOs was the first substantive post:
http://www.theoildrum.com/classic/2005/03/oil-price-changes.html
But that is merely a quibble, as it has been a joy to watch the site grow, and the depth of posts and comments broaden as much as it has.
Thanks everyone, but particularly Prof and Super G, 'cos they're the ones who have really built the foundation that has got us here today.
HO
Oh my God ... now I can document it and give you the theory & data ...
I could just copy Dave's comment to describe my own thoughts when I found LAOTC, a wonderful resource for all. LAOTC was my first introduction to peak oil as well. I told my fiancee all about what I discovered and how I thought peak oil would affect our lives. Two months later she dumped me, coincidence? (Matt, you destroyed my life but I still read your site daily, no hard feelings. I'll see you in the FEMA camp buddy.) Now that I'm single again I have much more time to spend reading LAOTC and TOD which is awesome!
But a tip of the hat to more people than just Matt. To all of you who provide such wonderful information to TOD I thank you. I hesitate to post sometimes feeling that I am not worthy. I wish I had more to contribute to the community here. Thank you all for letting me learn from your research and knowledge.
I wish we were all wrong. I wish my friends and family would stop giving me tin foil hats as gag gifts. I don't think any of us will be laughing about this in the end. TOD is only the beginning of the discussion that not end in my lifetime.
Good luck everyone,
Rex
I appreciate the kind words. Now let's address the "meaty" part of your post . . .
I've gotten an email almost identical to your post about every two weeks for the last two years: a guy emails me to say their girlfriend or fiance dumped them because they read my site and got freaked. Then they follow it by saying, "but I'm not mad at you. . .." Yeah right. From the "profit of doom" joke to the FEMA camp to the bit about how being single is great cause you have more time o read LATOC and TOD!, the passive aggresiveness is just pouring out from your post.
I will tell you what I tell every other hard up guy who emails me about their romantic problems: I STRONGLY suspect she dumped you for reasons that had more to do with YOU than with your awareness of Peak Oil visavi LATOC. But it's much easier for you to point to my site as the original source of your problems.
=)
You're right, of course there were other reasons but my doomerism was certainly one of them. I didn't intend for you to misuse your time replying to my post. I just hoped some TODers could get a chuckle out of it.
Rex
It was the first time I heard about peak oil, but the concept seemed very reasonable to me. I couldn't believe I hadn't thought about it on my own, in other words it was an eye opening experience. From that day I read all I could find, not much later I was reading TOD daily and have been more or less ever since. Grats to you all with the milestones.
And congrats to all TODers who post info and analysis.
One of the things I like -- besides the great content and analysis offered in the posts, is that for the most part people have a great attitude and behave in a very civil fashion.
I think that when we consider a problem like peak oil, it is refreshing to converse online with folks who are really trying to come to grips with the matter, its implications, and "what to do." Of course we get tense at times, but the folks commenting quite often pull themselves out of any disrespectful exchanges and move back to careful and respectful discourse. That is a very good thing, and speaks highly of the regular participants.
Kudos! Encore! And stuff like that.....
I'd say a whole lot more but I notice we've got another violent thunderstorm coming down the valley at us and I need to disconnect the computer from the Rest Of The World before it gets fried.
Gotta go.
Uber
As some of you know, I'm a farmer/rancher, small-scale and environmentally oriented. I'm realizing that this biofuels thing might someday make me prosperous as the cost of food goes up.
But I'm not sure how to think about this ethically. Will I someday be forced to grow fence line-to-fence line (and ruin my topsoil) to try to feed a burgeoning population? Is it even moral to grow biofuels when people somewhere are hungry?
Energy depletion will put many of us in a real crisis, I'm afraid. Hopefully TOD will continue to be a good place to iron out some of these coming dilemmas.
Thanks again, guys, for a great site!
As for TOD, the posts have gotten better and better. The comments are a bit noisier than they once were, but there's still plenty of meat there. Some kind of comment ranking system (ala Slashdot) would be nice. That's the only suggestion I can make. This has been the second site I visit each morning for a long time now.
I have a friend whose family lived near a railroad yard in Denver during the Great Depression. When the hobos would come to the back door asking for food, his mother would give them a bowl of beans from a pot she kept on the stove and a slice of bread.
That seemed like a generous and thoughtful appoach to helping each other through hard times.
But we live in a world where the rate of violent crime is many times what it was in the 1930s (I think in the US case something like 8 times the murder rate).
And there is far greater distrust of poor people, and there are a lot more guns around. In general, methods of social control and forces for social cohesion are much weaker. And society is far more urbanised and suburbanised-- the majority of Americans lived on farms in the 1930s.
And of course people are much more mobile.
If the US did suddenly have 25% unemployment, again, I don't see there being the same spontaneous outreach (perhaps in smaller communities?)-- everyone would be too busy looking after their own patch.
I knew this suburbia thing would someday screw us ...
I think you may have created a priceless resource.
I was first directed here by Westexas, I think I read an article of his on 321 Energy, sent him an email and he pointed me at Stuart Staniford's work over here.
Right now I have an invite to visit the DTI who are offering to help with more background data, I should also get invited to present to the Petroleum Exploration Society of Great Britain to talk on EU energy security and the folks at the Oil Depeltion Analysis Centre have also been in touch. That elusive invite to talk to our politicians and their advisors has not yet arrived - but it is just a matter of finding the right buttons to press.
In the UK, the government has just published a massive report warning of the potential economic damage of global warming - and that our life styles / energy consumption patterns will have to change. I'm still not sure whether or not they are fully aware of the energy crisis, which I think is at the door, and are wrapping this up in the less alarmist launguage of global warming?
Anyway Congratulations - readership seems to be growing faster than the world population - though it may be wise to express stats on a growth per capita basis.
It's seen as a fringe interest if anyone has heard of it.
The real worry is about Global Warming.
http://uk.theoildrum.com/story/2006/10/31/15295/970
Then go out buy a wood buring stove and check out your pension plan.
is here http://www.hm-treasury.gov.uk/independent_reviews/stern_review_economics_climate_change/stern_review _report.cfm
It is in line with many things about GW I've been reading lately including anything from James Hansen at Nasa. That is here
http://www.giss.nasa.gov/research/features/altscenario/
It's grim and strong stuff. I'm sure many people here are aware of it. I'd think there'd be a way for the PO people and the GW people to get together.
this Stern report is the first? or early attempt to put an economic price on global warming and what we do or don't do about it.
For those who have said GW is a bad thing but how can we work our economies around it this is an answer to that question. Or, at least, an attempt or starting point for the discussion .
I've read the executive summary, info from the UK Guardian newspaper online, and two chapters on the effects of climate from the Stern report.
The STern report says that humanity can have some measure of growth and stabilize the climate, too. I wonder how that will be received but it seems like we can limit growth or cook every living thing on the earth to death along with outselves.
I haven't read the Oil Depletion thing by Heinberg so I don't know how this would fit together with it.
It is definitely of interest to TOD readers.