4 years of blogging

I started this blog exactly 4 years ago, on April 12, 2008. Here are my top 10 posts from the past year:

1.  Live-blogging most of the Republican presidential primary debates: #1, #2, #3, #4, #5, #6, #7, #8, #9, #10, #11, #12, #13, #14

2. Do you give to charity to help people or for other reasons?

3. Is throwing a pie in the face of an unsuspecting victim ever a good idea?

4. If Mitt Romney doesn't "know" global warming is mostly caused by humans, is he "against science"?

5. Is it effective to argue that homosexuality "isn't a choice"?

6. The fundamental difference in how liberals and conservatives think of themselves

7. Is the death penalty "racist"?

8. 2 surprising pay gaps

9. Something is starting to creep me out about advertising in general, and Apple's advertising in particular.

10. How much of a problem is it that you don't have enough time in your whole life to become "reasonably well-read"?

The top 10 posts from year 3 of this blog

I started this blog on April 12, 2008, exactly 3 years ago. As I've done at the end of the 1st year and 2nd year, here are my 10 favorite posts from this past year.

1. Blogger of the Day: Andrew Sullivan, The Crusader

2. Scheduling life

3. The top 10 greatest classical composers of all time

4. We're all hypocrites.

5. The view of computers from 1982 and the view of photography from 1859

6. What is the atheist / secular humanist / free thought community missing?

7. Did the journalists who reported on the Koran burning threat understand what they were doing?

8. Getting it wrong about language and more

9. Professor Robert Summers of Cornell Law School

10. How to use "What would I regret the most?" to make life decisions

The top 10 posts from year 2 of this blog

It was two years ago today that I wrote and published the first post on this blog.

As with the first blogiversary, here are 10 posts from year 2 of this blog that I find the most worth going back to:

1. 6 ways blogs are better than books

2. The 100 best songs of the decade

3. 17 online dating profile cliches that women should avoid

4. The 2 most overused chord progressions in pop music

5. The movie scene I think of every time I hear the "brilliant filmmaker" defense of Roman Polanski

6. Do women earn less money than men for equal work?

7. Abortion rights and quality of life

8. Robert Wright's self-contradictory attack on the "new atheists"

9. Kant's categorical imperative vs. the golden rule

10. "What are the simple concepts that have most helped you understand the world?"

Stay tuned for more blogiversary content throughout this week . . .

10 more posts from a year of blogging

Yesterday I listed my 10 favorite posts from year 1 of this blog. Now here are 10 runners-up:

11. 25 random things about me

12. What's so bad about product placement? 

13. Haydn's brilliant blandness

14. Two kinds of careers

15. "Do you see what's happening?"

16. Let me tell you about the awesome musicians I know -- post 1, post 2, post 3

17. The philosopher paradox

18. The fake skinny women contest

19. David Brooks on morality

20. Vignette of an unmade argument

Top 10 posts from a year of blogging

A year ago today, I took a walk to Mother's in Austin and wrote in a Moleskine notebook over breakfast (probably migas and coffee). When I was done, I walked back home, typed up what I'd written, and published it to the world:

First post

So, I've started a blog...

I want the blog to be personal. ... Does "personal" mean a blog that's obsessively self-centered and introspective, confirming all those critics of blogs as internet-powered narcissism? I certainly hope so. I'll do my best...

I want this to be a leisurely, contemplative blog, not a "Here's what's going on this second" blog. There's probably a greater excess of content in the world right now than at any previous point in history. We have a glut of content but a dearth of thought. I'm trying to correct the balance.

And as you can see from that statement, I'm also trying to avoid the false modesty that's rampant on the blogosphere. So many blogs pitch themselves as "random babblings" or "incoherent rants." Why all the self-deprecation? Anyway, I'll have none of that here! I either want to do this well or not do it all.

And now, in the spirit of self-promotion and self-aggrandizement heralded by that first post, here are my top 10 posts from a year of blogging. "Top 10" may be a misnomer, since this isn't necessarily "the best of Jaltcoh" -- I'll leave it to others to judge their actual merit. But here are the ones I find most worth going back to:

1. What are the disadvantages of being male?

2. Thank you, Tim Russert (1950-2008)

3. The top 40 grunge songs -- 40-36, 35-31, 30-26, 25-21, 20-16, 15-11, 10-6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, the end.

4. The death penalty -- does it saves lives, and if so, should liberals support it? -- post 1, post 2, post 3, post 4

5. The top 120 moments on the path to the White House -- post 1, post 2, post 3, post 4

6. Live-blogging the 2008 debates -- post 1, post 2, post 3, post 4

7. Imogen Heap - Beauty in the breakdown

8. The problem of evil -- post 1, post 2

9. How to write a New York Times article to make it seem like women work harder than men

10. Michel Petrucciani, 1962-1999

I ended that first post in mid-air: "Let's see how it goes..." So, how did it go?

In the last year, I've posted 265 posts, been linked at least 217 times, and had about 108,000 visitors.

Thanks for this goes, above all, to my mom (Ann Althouse) and Glenn Reynolds (Instapundit). Of course, the full thanks would go to more people than I can keep track of -- everyone who's followed the blog, commented, linked, and given feedback. This includes LemmusLemmus (Church of Rationality), Summer Anne Burton (Boingy Boingy), Jeff (Stuff Running 'Round My Head), Zachary Paul Sire (Sire Says), Stubborn Facts, my girlfriend (Danielle Pouliot), and my dad (Richard Lawrence Cohen).

Thanks to everyone for reading, thinking about, adding to, and arguing with what's on my mind when I'm typing on my MacBook or writing in a Moleskine at a cafe. I hope to keep going for at least a few more years.