Most online users

[bassfan586]

Everybody had the day off due to ice.  468 users online today.  Most ever.  Thought that was pretty cool.

[bassfan586]

474 check that

[TCook]

Im pretty sure this web site has a glitch at the moment and is showing everyone that has logged on in the last couple days.

[mikesmiph]

2/3 of them are porno dealers in Zimbabwe

[TCook]

Yep if you look above the users online it says users logged on in the last 1440 minutes

[Skulley]

At Outdoorama, DK was telling me that this site has daily intrusions from unscrupulous persons overseas.  He was saying that it has become quite a problem.  These people make multiple attacks daily.  He said some of them try to register multiple times throughout the course of a 24 hour period.  He told me that he monitors daily as he is trying to protect the site and all the valuable info on the site. He also told me that some of those hits in 1440 minutes is google, yahoo, and other search engines finding the site for persons using the search engines. 

BD.                       

[TCook]

We all know about the bots and hackers thanks for breaking that down for us again, this thread is about the confusion of the amount of users online. Its simple, normally glb shows the amount of users currently online and not all users that logged on in the last 1440 minutes like it shows now.

[mikesmiph]

I was just trying to make a joke. Guess it wasnt funny

[TCook]

I was referring to bigdudes post not yours mike, I got a chuckle out of that.

[Skulley]

We all know about the bots and hackers thanks for breaking that down for us again, this thread is about the confusion of the amount of users online. Its simple, normally glb shows the amount of users currently online and not all users that logged on in the last 1440 minutes like it shows now.

You could say that the site is under attack as we speak.  I know it's you because of the way you're posting.  You know it's me by the way I'm posting.  So we know that we're for real.  Is everybody for real??  A lot of these screen names could be compromised and that's why they are showing up.  Matter of fact DK, did mention that these intruders were using already existing screen names.  Maybe the hacker got into the membership area of the sight.  Possibilities Cook.......possibilities.

2/3 of them are porno dealers in Zimbabwe

It really isn't that funny Mike, but you know what..............it's valid.  Credible info even though meant to be a joke.  Don't you have some kind of status here on GLB like sponsor or moderator or something like that.  I believe that this sight is under attack right now.  I know DK is doing all he can to fix it.



BD                                 

[djkimmel]

Except EVERYONE knows the porno dealers do not come from Zimbabwe. They are mostly home-grown from the good ole US. They just hijack foreign IP addresses or pay some of the 'natives' from lower income countries to do the 'dirty' work for them.

No. We aren't under attack - well, anymore than normal - and NO users have been compromised in the making of this forum.

In fact, the brute force attack has mostly been shutdown after I put about 8 hours of work into it. I hear from other sites that they are still under attack bigtime (so, I hope you don't mind, but I patted myself on the back, just once, over that). I'm not sure how long I will stay this fortunate...? Probably until the social-minded people who are providing the free, anonymous servers the attackers are using decide to change them around again.

WARNING: Boring marketing business stuff coming up. Read past this point at your own risk: I did make a change however and because it has been a busy week, I crossed my fingers that it wouldn't cause a big stir and didn't take the time to announce it first - sorry. To be frank, I'm really fighting at the moment to make enough income to keep going, to keep this website alive while I try to figure out how to make enough money to pay the bills and not go back to a full-time job again where I don't have the time to keep up with the amount of work the site now takes.

Not trying so sound like I'm crying or anything (though I'm sure it has sounded like that to some of the people who have talked to me in the past two weeks), just very tough to run your own business and make enough income to keep running it. It's too big to not run it that way and I'm also working on many other web projects. Cost for everything is going up while income is not going up at the same rate. Lost 4 advertisers this winter already. Hate when that happens, but it's just part of trying to fund something that has expenses. I have picked up a few new advertisers thank goodness. I hope I can keep them.

So... upon looking at some of my more successful competitors - something that never hurts to do, most of whom have a 5 or more year head start on me, I found that some of them are marketing differently than me by showing more impressive stats. One way to do this is to give a better picture of how popular your site is by showing a broader representation of the traffic you get. I was only showing about the last 15 minutes, which led some people to believe (think possible paying advertisers) that GreatLakesBass.com was less successful than it is.

Hate when that happens too. Sometimes, I don't even get a shot at them after they take a quick look. So... I changed the visible, public stats period from the last 15 minutes to the last 24 hours as some of my competitors have also done. The same competitors who potential advertisers compare me to before they consider me or not. I was pretty happy that we had 190 visitors on here within 15 minutes recently on a February day, but then someone sees another site had 5,000 visitors and thinks, wow, GreatLakesBass.com is small. Eek, right?

The who's online feature is never 100% accurate since it was a rolling 15 minutes. Going by that will never tell you who is online for sure right this moment (and members can choose to not show their status publicly). I hope you all aren't driven too crazy by it, but I have to show visitors a better representation of how popular the site is compared to other sites, especially the older, bigger sites.

I hope you all understand and like the site enough to be willing to put up with the change. I was really happy to see my biggest February ever, probably due to the Classic coverage with almost 12,000 unique visitors. I can't compare to some of the older sites who have 8 to 15 times the members we do, but we're doing a pretty good. In November, we came close to the number of visits Bassfan had that same month (cool to me anyway). They kick my butt about 3 to 1 in past summer months, but maybe not forever... who knows?

And a shout out to the 1,133 visits by the Japanese 'fan base' in February. Mention Japan and bass fishing a few times and they come in droves, I guess. That's like 10 times the normal number of Japanese visits I get per month. I think Colin also single-handedly has us about 10 times the normal traffic from Down Under too. Thanks Colin!

Really, all of you who talk about the website to people, and visit and post friendly content are so important to keeping GreatLakesBass.com going, I can never thank you enough. I sure hope to get the income into the black enough down the road that I can throw more contests and give away more cool stuff to you. I am planning a fishing reports posting contest for this year I'll announce after the Grand Rapids show.

In the meantime, I hope you'll see if you can get used to a longer stats period display. I kind of like getting a quick view of who has been on today myself rather than just the past few minutes. I also think it would be even cooler if the stats WERE that big for the last 15 minutes. But that will take some time and a lot of effort by many.

Most important again THE SITE IS NOT UNDER ATTACK! No more than normal anyway

[djkimmel]

bassfan586 had it right though when he said today. Actually, we had days in February that went much higher than that. No one knew though because the public stats only showed the last 15 minutes. We went over 1,000 one day!!!! That makes me happy.

And some of the 'guests' are search engine and similar 'bots' but a lot of them are 'shy' people (some call them lurkers), new visitors or people who don't log in every time they visit. I actually hear from some of them. I really never do know what I'm going to hear next when I answer the phone. Kind of cool.

[djkimmel]

Couple examples of phone calls I get thanks to this site just in case someone is curious at all:

Driving through Alabama on the way home from the Classic, phone rings. Pick it up. It's 'Matt' from Oregon Senator Olsen's office. Do I have a phone number for Robert Montgomery? The Senator needs to get hold of him urgently! Well, no (though I was standing next to him yesterday in the media room), but I can put him in touch with one of his editors who can probably hook him up... Never mind. Someone else just got him in touch. Thanks.

Apparently, if you are a known bass angler (because you have a website that says you're a bass angler), you know every other bass-related person! Because there's only 20 or 30 of us (I guess)!!

Couple weeks ago, answer the phone in the evening. Nice elderly gentleman from Georgia who is having a hard time finding someone who can help him out. He's talked to BASS, the chamber of commerce and a few others. And no help so far.

What's he looking for you ask? He has a home on West Point Lake and wants to really help out one of the several new, young Elite anglers, who is just getting started. Who probably could use the help considering how expensive fishing those tournaments is. This gentleman had read about the expense and challenges in his local paper and he wanted to make a difference. Help make one of these angler's dreams come true, if he could.

Just so happens I know a young angler who fits that bill, I tell this super nice man. Wonderful he says. They can use the home (and two boat stall on the lake) for the Elite tournament and even pre-practice he says because he read about how they come down early and do that. We'll give them a real taste of Southern hospitality while they're here! Maybe some of his neighbors will even join in in the future, he tells me.

Does it matter where the angler is from, I ask? No as long as it is one of the new guys just getting started who could really use the help. A few calls later and two first-time Elite anglers have a free place to stay for when they need it when fishing West Point Lake! Pretty cool!

I wonder who will call next...? Gotta go. Phones ringing.

[bassfan586]

Thats very cool Dan.  I do wear the Glb shirts and people ask and I point them in the sites direction.  I even got a few of my fishin buds to sign up.  I come to this site far more than the other ones.  Mainly because its fishing heavy and not a lot of drama.(Like almost none) And thats what I really like.  Just a great group of like minded sportsmen getting together.  I know what you mean about running a buisness and expenses.  A lot of people think its not hard and don't know about the 26 hour days 8 days a week.  I hope you don't have to go back working for "the man" other than yourself.  Somehow it all works out in the end.

[MadWags]

I consider this site my home. It is the finest on the web in my opinion. Dan has done awesome job developing and growing this site. I wish him many blessings for his efforts and hard work. It is our job to help improve this site further by utilizing the tools he has giiven us to use. I may even step out of my shell and do some video this year to post on GLB.
Will any of these titles peek your interest.
"Crankin Clair"
"Finding Fertile Flats"
"Deep Flipping Dropshot"
"Clairolina"

[Victor Cerabone]

Interesting stuff about the marking side of the site Dan.  I too consider this my angling "home" site.  Please let me know what I can do send more sucess for the site your way.


Vic

[Dan]

Yea, I know about those phone calls. I was watching the GVSU basketball game,  a week or two ago, and my phone rings. I'm lucky to hear it because of the crowd noise. I answer it, and it's some guy that has a website out of the Lansing area calling me from the Classic. Seems this guy was down there video taping and doing a bang up job reporting on one of the premier sporting events of the year. Even though it was a wrong number, I felt honored to have his number come up on my cell phone.

PS: About 50 hits a day to GLB are from me checking on what's going on. It's a site I check frequently. None better for getting fishing and boating info. The guys that post are some of the best anglers around. I just hope they stay on their side of the state .

[Skulley]

Glad to hear that things are on the up side DK.  During our conversation I must of misinterpreted some of what you were talking about.  I consider this one of my 7 or 8 homepages.  When I open up my Mozilla browser this site is on the first tab.  I stay logged in 100% of the time at home.  That way I don't have to try to remember my password every time I log in.  On another note, hey TCook, you ready to partner up with me on the DK Open East in May??  So far it's looking good for me being able to finally make it to one of these.   



BD                         

[MadWags]

I was hoping to fish with you Dog!

[mikesmiph]

I'm just hoping to fish. The boat remodel is NOT going well.