I'm talking with ScienceBlogs, home of Cognitive Daily, Pharyngula, Gene Expression, Deltoid, and several other good blogs, about moving Mixing Memory over there. Dave Munger of Cognitive Daily thought moving over there might make for some great opportunities for two cognitive psychology blogs to play off each other, and I think he's right. Plus, moving to ScienceBlogs tends to increase traffic, and I like the idea of exposing more poeple to cognitive science; especially people from other sciences (most of the blogs there are life science blogs, if you haven't noticed). Plus, it gives me an opportunity to get away from Blogger, with which I've had problems since I started. The blogger site would remain open, though, as an archive for all of the Mixing Memory posts that are already here.
Anyway, the reason I'm writing this is that since I started this blog, I've relied heavily on the suggestions and advice from readers, and I wouldn't want to make a big move like this without asking for comments. So, what do you think? Let me know in comments or, if you prefer, drop me an email.
P.S. If you're wondering, the meme post is coming (it's probably going to be a few posts), and so is one on theory-theory, though I haven't yet decided whether to do theory-theory generally, or focus on a couple applications, like theory of mind (theory-theory vs. simulation theory, in a 12 round bout) and/or causal reasoning.
14 comments:
you should do it. the kinks are mostly out of the system since we last talked about this, and you would be a very good fit. myself, my own weblog that is non-science blog gets decent traffic, but my exp. is that being on SB gets you a different and more general sort of exposure.
Go for it. I enjoy scienceblogs and seed magazine!
Sounds like a great opportunity -- congrats!
definitely go ahead!
I frequently read your blog and enjoy your insights and writing style very much. I think your site can only get better with a move to Science Blogs.
I am a big fan of Seed Magazine and also read the Cognitive Daily blog. I think there could be some good synergy between both of your blogs, and I'm confident you'll get more eyeballs with the move.
Finally, although it may be tricky and/or laborious, I hope you consider importing the archives into your new blog. Also, how about creating a tagging or category system to help organize similar posts? I know that this can sometimes be difficult, but I think it would help all of us to identify particular areas of interest and sift through old content.
Good luck and congrats!
Hey anon, thanks for the compliments. I'm glad you like the blog.
I tried to do the category thing (see the sidebar) once, but it was so much work that I eventually just stopped doing it. It's a pain on blogger, without a hack. But maybe it will be easier over at ScienceBlogs. I'll certainly work on it.
it will be easier.
Definitely move over to Scienceblogs. I'd love to see this there.
Congratulations! I think that it's a good move to make.
MovableType, although non-common-sensical, has some things better than Blogger. First, the categories are automated. Second, you can write a bunch of posts in advance of a vacation, trip or a busy time, and let the system publish the post at pre-programmed dates/times.
Being on SEED also gives you tech-support, greater traffic, good neighbors, and a generally high quality of readers.
As for old posts, different people do it differently. Dave Munger moved the complete Archives to the new blog. Since it took him several days to do so, I susupect the process is manual. Most of the others do something that is IMHO better: they re-publish their old posts on the new blog, one at a time. With an increase in traffic, many readers see those old posts for the first time. That way, one can also choose to re-publish only the "best of" and ignore less-than-good posts. This also makes it easier to fill the weekly "quota" of posts, as re-publishing does not count as "cross-posting" (which is limited to 4 per week).
Now, rare are the posts on Mixing Memory that do not deserve to be in the "best of" category, so you can republish one old post per day for a year if you want and enjoy the weather...
I did indeed move all my posts over, but it wasn't manual. The problem is, if you have any internal links (to other posts on your own blog), then they break when you move them over. With 140 posts to check, that took me a few days. But I was only working on the transition for an hour or two each day. I'd guess it was 10 hours of work, tops.
Once I moved all the old posts and redirected the old URL, the traffic to the new site more than doubled. I'm not sure if this is a temporary effect of the move, but I'm enjoying the level of interest right now.
The only serious problem with scienceblogs, in my view, is the lack of control. If an ad is especially annoying (I won't mention any names, History Channel), there's really nothing we authors can do about it other than complain to the management (which we've been doing, loudly).
OTOH, a lot of problems are taken care of by the pros there before we even think of them. And, as I've told you before it's great to be a member of such a thoughtful community of scientists and writers.
This sounds like a great opportunity for you. Go for it!
Just be sure you let us know where to find you....
Suzette Haden Elgin
Yes, collaboratin is good thing. And yes. the science blog will definitely help you in getting more and more traffic.
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