Dear faithful readers,
I am considering something that I've avoided for a long time, and this is a direct result of some decisions that Google has recently made regarding the back-end of their blogging platform, Blogger.
In the past, I've had a fairly good idea of what visitors were interested in, and tried to tilt my content somewhat - within my own interests - toward readers. Recently Google made some major changes to the Blogger interface, and it reduced my ability to see what subjects readers are interested in.
For example: I could get a lot of information on where readers arrived from, which pages got read, and what readers searched for using the search tool at the top of the blog. That information is now very limited and nearly worthless.
It may be that Google is nudging people toward installing Google Analytics, to get better data, and more information on you readers. I don't know the answer to that. I have a deep mistrust of Silicon Valley and don't like the idea of deep-monitoring people's behavior or reading habits - nor of sharing that information with unknown parties.
Nevertheless, since they have sharply curtailed my ability to better serve readers - again, within my own knowledge and interests - I am considering installing Google Analytics, to get a better idea of what reader's interests are.
I do not intend to allow ads or try to make money from this - I do it to try and inform and educate readers about the handful of things that I sorta understand. Google Analytics is designed more with retailing in mind, so I don't know if it will be useful to a lowly blogger. Anyway my mind is not yet made up on this.
Let me know what you think and I will make a decision and let ya know.