Where have I been?
Posted on Sunday, November 18th, 2007 at 1:39pm. #
Dan Taylor has just posted his most-visited websites (according to del.icio.us). I’m quite a fan of #28, but I thought I’d post something similar.
I don’t use del.icio.us as a bookmarking tool - rather more a social sharing tool. Instead, I use Google Bookmarks, and Google’s Web History has a fairly comprehensive view of my internet use. At least - it should. It knows every single website I visit, courtesy of the Google toolbar which is on every machine I use. Curiously, I can’t get “the sites I visit most” from the web history. What I can get is what I search for most, and my use of Google - which might be vaguely interesting.
First, I’ve now made 10,215 searches with Google (there’s a scary thing).
Looking at my use of Google over the past 12 months, it’s interesting to see what I’ve been looking at.
My #1 query is the #1 query to get into Media UK - London Lite. This is mainly here for my own search-engine optimisation work. Similarly, #3, #4 and #5 are also all queries for search-engine optimisation, particular to my work at Virgin Radio.
Interestingly, Gmail is my second-highest search. I suspect this is because one of the machines I use doesn’t do ctrl+enter auto-filling, and therefore Firefox is querying Google, on my behalf, when I type “gmail” into the address bar and hit enter. It does appear to work!
I’ll not reproduce those searches here (I’m good to my old employer), but here are my top sites…
Top sites
1. en.wikipedia.org - normally for background about subjects
2. www.php.net - for reference on PHP functions
3. www.bbc.co.uk - my employer!
4. james.cridland.net - probably to help me find old blog posts to cross-link to
5. www.google.com - interesting, this one. Perhaps this is related to Gmail?
6. www.mediauk.com - My own website, and related to the SEO work mentioned above
7. www.w3schools.com - for reference on CSS styling, particularly
8. ubuntuforums.org - interesting this is so high, and reflects my own support queries
9. backstage.bbc.co.uk - probably looking for feeds and things
10. news.bbc.co.uk - the third employer-related link. Aren’t I good?
Interestingly, in my “top clicks” list, Dan Taylor’s very own blog is #9 in the list - probably related to his regular “top albums of the year” feature, given he shares a spookily similar musical choice to me, and I suffer from search-blindness when going to allofmp3 mp3sparks Amazon iTunes to buy my music.
Not sure what all this says about me, but interesting to look into, nonetheless: like Dan, note the lack of “Web2.0″ snazziness in my most visited sites.
Photo: Peter Kaminski; used under licence
