December 27th, 2005 was our first post ever, thus making yesterday the 3 year anniversary of our humble little weblog. It's hard to imagine this website has been around 3 years. What an amazing ability it's given us to record the events of our family. This place truly is a living history of our lives, providing us an opportunity to archive our past for future use. We probably go back and look up posts more than any of our readers do! Thanks for being an interactive part of our family diary! The following is the forward I (Zak) wrote in our first book, ZumwaltOhana.com: Year One, which I think in large part is still apropos:
It's a time when billions of individuals the world over are congregating in chat rooms, uploading to YouTube, downloading from iTunes, and expressing themselves in MySpace. Everyone, it seems, has a public voice and the means to be heard. Perhaps more profound than the accessibility of a global audience to anyone who desires it, is the fathomless ocean of souls willing to hear it; to connect, to reach out and experience life with one another. The World Wide Web does not now contain over 100 million pages because of its supply chain - its users infinitely broadcasting out on the public domain. Rather, the Internet's demand is the source of its success. Folks in Kansas enjoy watching video clips posted in Brazil. Korean students look forward to playing Everquest alongside their British counterparts. Hikers in Africa comment on New Zealand hiking blogs prior to visiting in person. The inclusive desires of our international population drive the Internet's success - we all want to connect with others, to belong, and to keep up.
ZumwaltOhana.com sprouted out of this undergrowth, this underlying reality that sustains the canopy of the Information Superhighway. Our website wasn't originally our idea; it was given to us as a Christmas present 1 year ago. It began as a living record of our day-to-days. However what we have all witnessed, indeed what we all should have predicted considering the macrocosm that is the Internet, was a transformation of ZumwaltOhana.com from a documentation of our lives to a more complete way to connect with others. At the time of this writing we have been visited 22,043 times by 10,856 people in 14 countries literally around the world (that's an average of 45 hits a day). To say that our little website has brought our friends and family closer to us would be a dramatic understatement. Through the marvels of the World Wide Web you have been able to observe the continuing maturation of our marriage, the struggle and joy of buying our first home, the birth and mind-boggling development of our first child, and our daily routine in the midst of it all. For your attention and desire to draw closer to us through ZumwaltOhana.com, we are deeply blessed and indebted to you. God be with us and our relationships with each other.
December, 11, 2006
If you're interested, since our first post on December 27, 2005:
- We've had 54,650 total hits
- 22,415 of our total hits were from different people (computers)
- We've been hit from 35 countries around the world (USA, Germany, Austria, Ireland, Finland, Morocco, Sudan, Panama, Benin, Malaysia, Oman, Mexico, Greece, United Arab Emerates, Guam, Canada, Brazil, United Kingdom, France, Philippines, Spain, Italy, Romania, Russia, Afghanistan, Iraq, Singapore, Netherlands, Sweden, Israel, Egypt, China, Korea, Japan, and Australia!)
- Our top 10 countries hit from are: US, Germany, Guam, UK, Canada, Romania, Australia, France, Philippines, Korea & Italy (Tie)
- We've averaged 49.9 hits a day
- We've averaged 1518 hits a month
- 93.6% of our hits were made with Microsoft Internet Explorer (Firefox next with 4.1%)
- 81.8% of our hits were made with Microsoft Windows XP (Windows NT next with 7.2%)
- 53.9% of our hits were made with 1024x768 resolution (800x600 resolution next with 12.2%)
- There have been 221 posts made
- There have been 990 comments made in response to our posts
- We make a post on average every 4.9 days
- We get an average of 4.4 comments per post
- We have had 59 photo albums (currently 57)
- There are 86 videos posted
- There are 1830 pictures in our photo albums
Thanks again for another wonderful year. The People are a great blessing to us!
