One of my favorite VC bloggers, Fred Wilson, recently posted on removing some widgets from his blog. Now Fred clearly attempts to try every plugin ever made, and I applaud him for the efforts. I’ve tried a few from time to time, and the two that I’ve decided caused the most hassle for LD are now gone.
Sitemeter
Why I used it: Built-in server statistics are less reliable than Windows ME.
What I liked: Seemed to keep pretty decent stats, and the stats views are real-time. Very handy for determining who is linking in. Considered mostly reliable for site metrics.
What I didn’t like: Tangibly slowed down page-loading, occasionally prevented site from loading in single-digit-seconds.
How I’m replacing it: Google Analytics. It doesn’t boast the same real-time capabilities, but I realized that I don’t care enough on a day-to-day basis to watch the numbers anyway.
My Del.ici.ous
Why I used it: Very convenient way for me to link to a story I found interesting without having to add a full blog post for it.
What I liked: Helped keep content “fresh” on the home page.
What I didn’t like: Extremely buggy, caused really ugly script errors that were all-too visible.
How I’m replacing it: I’m not. I’ll keep bookmarking sites I like, and those who care can track them here. I’ll probably try to add more short-form blog posts anyway, since myunbelievablylong essays are a little much for the average reader.
Anyone have any other plugin recommendations that I should check out? I browse the WordPress codex intermittently, am I missing the boat on anything?
I too killed Sitemeter. Google Analytics is prettier to look at and carries more weight (though it probably reports 10% less traffic than SM)… plus NOT obsessing over real time stats let me concentrate on more productive things.
I’ve had a few requests for a subscribe to comments feature which I added. I’m not sure if I can track how many people are using it, but it was easy enough to add. I tried a few Digg plugins, but it just seemed a little too gratuitous – the people who use Digg know how to submit without me advertising it. I haven’t put it in yet, but a related posts plugin is useful.
Lastly, if you’re thinking of upgrading to WordPress 2.1 (released yesterday) be aware some of your plugins may break. The auto-save feature sounds great, but I’m thinking of holding off until 2.1.1 is released in case they missed any bugs.
From the SiteMeter Weblog ( http://weblog.sitemeter.com/2007/01/26/slow-servers-lag-and-delayed-reporting/ ) – January 26th, 2007 Slow Servers, Lag, and Delayed Reporting – >>