After almost 2 years of kicking around the idea of starting an anime blog I decided four years ago today to see if I could write an anime blog and keep up with it. I guess the answer was – yes I could. (With the caveat that my writing style never developed into something that I liked and I haven’t been posting as much as I’d like to .)

Looking over my previous anniversary posts I noticed that they get shorter each year and this trend will probably continue this year though I might start showing my age by reminiscing about the good old days …

… Thinking back, it was a strange decision to make about starting a blog. I was always more math/science attuned and find organizing my thoughts into something coherent on paper a very difficult task. For example, that comment I left in the previous post took me almost two hours to write. Also, during the anime season that I started blogging, Winter 2008, I was feeling burned out over anime and was only watching one series. Why this was a good time to start blogging about anime is beyond me now. …

Sorry about that; reaching four years isn’t even that old compared to many blogs out there.

Before I lose anymore eyeballs to my meandering thoughts, I want to wholeheartedly thank the people who continue to read and comment on my little blog.

I don’t want to promise that I’ll write more in the upcoming year since that hasn’t worked in the previous years but I don’t foresee myself stopping anytime soon. I love anime as much as I did when I started and I still want to see more people watching anime and more people deepening their own love of anime by trying out new genres of anime.

And because someone might actually care, some stats:

• 438 total posts
• 1,096,351 total views
• 1986 total comments and
• 84,471 spam comments

-

If I had funny search terms that brought people here I’d include them but looking them over I really don’t have anything that funny .

There are many ways to measure the success of a blog; any honest blogger would rightly say that numerical standards are not the best judge but that same honest blogger would admit that having good numbers is a nice thing. So, I’d be lying that I’m not psyched that The Null Set reached such a lofty level as getting a million hits (or page views, if you swing that way) because it must mean I’m doing something right but this elation is tempered with the knowledge that I still see much room for improvement before I’m satisfied with my work here.

My most heartfelt thanks goes out to everyone that’s stopped by over the years; I’m glad The Null Set was able to be of some use to you.

And now since I’m making a meta post, I might as well mention a few other items. The first is that I finally broke down and decided to make an account at MyAnimeList. I realize MAL is so 3 years ago but it finally dawned on me that I’ve watched loads of anime and the point is approaching when I won’t remember everything I’ve seen. I’m still getting use to all that I can do with MAL but I have finished my list. The other benefit is now I can add the nifty widget so people can see what I’m currently watching because the world has been desperately curious about what anime I’m watching .

The second starts after I got tired of how limited the Archive widget is. I decided to create my own because I wanted to include a way to pick out my best/favorite/interesting posts so they could be found by newer readers and others that may have missed them. You can click on the link in the top bar to see the result. For each month it states how many posts there were and links to a listing of all the posts for that month. Additionally, within each month’s block is the title and link of my best/favorite/interesting posts that were written in that month.

The third is to mention my new banner. Like the one it replaced, it includes Alpha from Yokohama Kaidashi Kikou – my favorite manga – and it uses a picture I took. I don’t know if I believe what I’ve heard about how the sunsets over Lake Erie are some of the prettiest in the world but they are definitely, at least, beautiful. I can just imagine Alpha sitting, contemplating and enjoying them.

xkcd - one of the funniest webcomics ever.

The actual birthday was on January 21st, which makes The Null Set exactly the same age as Hanner’s Anime Blog.

I’d like to thank everyone that’s taken time to read The Null Set over the past three years; it’s been a more successful and gratifying experience then I’d’ve ever imagined and it’s because of you. I would also like to thank those that take the time to comment on The Null Set (except the spammers out there); I oftentimes don’t reply promptly or even at all or leave comments on the blogs run by the commentators (even when I really enjoy their blogs) but I read and cherish each comment made.

The highlight of this year for me was my last minute entry into the Aniblog Tournament and then somehow squeaking into the Top 8 (where I got pounded by one of my favorite blogs – Kurogane’s). Now, I don’t think I’m nowhere near being the eighth best aniblog out there – I could easily pick at least 20 other blogs that I think that are miles better – but it did feel great to see people actually voting for this blog. I’m sure the next time I’ll get paired against someone like Star-Crossed or Baka-Raptor and lose in the first round.

Somewhere along the way this year I realized that I probably will never stop blogging about anime. I might post at a slower rate but I don’t see myself stopping. Anime still has the power to wow me and I like the community that’s been built up around anime blogs. (Where else would I find such a diverse cast of interesting characters from the far corners of the earth?)

Last year I pledged to make the upcoming year the best year yet for The Null Set which didn’t really happen so this year I’m not pledging anything for the upcoming year. However, I do have a big surprise for readers of The Null Set coming soon that might just be the biggest thing that’s ever happened here.

And because there’s probably a few people out there that will find this interesting, let’s do some stats. As of this post I have had:

• 402 total posts
• 818,550 views
  
• 1603 comments and
  
• 12,681 spam comments.
• top day was 2,925 views on December 4, 2010
• and my top week was Dec 6-12 with 12,856 views.

My top ten posts of the last year are:

-

And let’s close with a screen-shot of Yuki. Why? Because it’s my party.

As you might have guessed by the title, yesterday marked the start of my match in the second round of the Aniblog Tournament. You may have also guessed that this post is the type of post that at some point, maybe after trying a bit of bribery or trash-talking or arguing for my superior worth, I’ll ask people to please go here to vote for The null set. And you’d be right on both accounts, but I’ll try to keep this interesting for you nonetheless.

Three Reasons Why You Should Vote For The Null Set

1.   I Have a Cute Nephew

And I have the pictures to prove it:

If that’s not a good enough reason to vote for me, I don’t know what is.

2.   I’m From Youngstown and I Know People

Sure some cities have nice sounding nicknames like ‘The City of Brotherly Love’ or ‘The Big Apple’ but my hometown has cooler sounding nicknames:  ‘Mob Town, USA’ and more recently ‘Murder Town, USA’. And don’t think these nicknames are misnomers, in the 90’s, for instance, Youngstown had the highest per capita homicide rate in America for many of the individual years of the 1990’s and we were either #2 or #3 all the other years.

3.   I’m Part Elven

If J.R.R. Tolkien is right about how elves develop a yearning for the sea the first time they get near it then it’s conceivable that I’m part elven because I seem drawn to it. Look how often it’s come up on my blog, here and here and here. In two months I’m going on a week long vacation at a beach house and that’s in addition to the beach trip I just went on (found a bunch of nice sea glass) and another trip sometime in June. Here’s some new pictures I took on the most recent visit.

Isn’t my blog the most awesome, so go here and vote for The null set now.

-

Okay, so this list wasn’t a serious one, though, everything said about me true. I do have a cute nephew and I’m proud of being from Youngstown and I do enjoy going to the beach. I included being from Youngstown because it is an important part of who I am. If you look past the nicknames and the murder rate and the inability to park your car on the street because sooner-or-later someone will break the windows in – I still think of it as a great place to live, it’s got the second largest urban park in America behind Central Park in New York City; the people are by and large good, hard-working people; and I’m optimistic the worst of it has past and the future will be a better one for Youngstown.

Now for the serious list as to why I think people should vote for The null set.

Three Reasons Why You Should Vote For The Null Set

1.   Unique Philosophy to The Null Set

I wanted The null set to be a successful anime blog and not wither away after a few short months. To do this, I needed to find something that would separate this blog from other blogs and I needed to believe that whatever this blog did, it had some importance to my potential readers.

What I eventually came up with as The null set’s mission is to get people to watch good anime, even if that means trying something they normally wouldn’t and to steer people away from wasting their time with bad anime. This influences everything I do, even if it’s not apparent. I normally write my anime posts as if the audience reading them has not seen the anime in question which means including as few spoilers as possible, among other things. The types of anime posts I write mainly – impression posts of new anime, series reviews, season previews, and seasonal/yearly anime awards – are designed with this mission in mind. I’d rather have people spending time watching good anime then spending time reading what I have to say about good and bad anime.

2.   Wider Variety of Content

I have only the highest respect for episodic blogs and their ability to cover the same shows week in and week out; I’d probably burn out quickly if I tried. I think the format, however, is very constricting and it would limit the quality of my blog since many of my most read posts and the posts I’m most proud about wouldn’t fit into that format.

For example, there was my rebuttal to Mr. Sherman, president of Bang Zoom, about the impending death of anime in America and from a couple of years ago, my two-part (1, 2) rebuttal to the “documentary” that Otaking put out. There’s also this post where I used the licensing patterns of the anime from 2008 to show that instead of blaming fansubs, maybe studio execs should be looking at the shows they license; the post still holds up well though there’s been some more licensing of 2008 anime shows since I wrote it back in November.

From time-to-time I like to pit two series or two characters against each other to see who would win. The most read one remains the Haruhi vs. Gurren Lagann one I did back in 2008 but the one I had the most fun putting together was the Haruka Minami vs. Ibuki Ikaruga battle because I was surprised by the winner.

I also enjoy dabbling with Photoshop because it exercises my creative side a different way then writing does. The result is often posting wallpapers that I’ve made. The Soul Eater ones (1, 2, 3) have been the most popular; my Toradora ones actually got linked to by a Japanese anime blog which I thought was great. My favorite wallpaper was one I did for Bakemonogatari that splices Araragi and Mayoi onto a picture I took while on vacation at Washington D.C.. I also once tried out vector tracing using Muraski from Kure-nai. And I also sometimes take the time to stitch together those pan-up shots the animators do of a really awesome outfit/character. The latest was one I did the other day after watching episode 5 of Katanagatari and I might as well share it with you know as thanks for reading this far down.

There’s also those posts that are hard to categorize except to say that something about the anime I was watching or manga I was reading at that time interested me and I wanted to share. There was a recent post about fixing a joke I read in the Sayonara, Zetsubou-sensei manga, there’s this post where I mention anime songs that make me cry, the post about how animators seem fascinated with the night sky, a post about how anime needs more mature characters, and the post where I talk about When an Anime Becomes a Keeper.

3.   Winning Would Do The Most Good For The Anime Blogosphere

I struggled with how to word this one without sounding presumptuous and I still don’t think I quite got it right. I’m not saying that my anime blog is super important or even more important than my opponent, Bokutachi no Blog, but the feedback I received during the first round and pressure to make my blog competitive for the second round pushed me to improve The null set and winning in this round will push me even harder to improve the quality of The null set to make it competitive for the next round. I have several ideas that I think would make very interesting posts which have been kicking around in my brain for a while now, waiting for a good time to get written, and trying to win in the third round would be a very good reason to get them written. I’m even thinking about bring back my weekly anime review.

-

So, hopefully, something I said has convinced you to go here and vote for The null set in the Aniblog Tournament; I’m currently behind by a little bit but with your help, I might just win.

Yes We Can! With your help The null set can win.

I wasn’t going to try the bribery route but I just had an idea that attempts to bribe while still keeping within the parameters of running The null set like normal. If I win my second round match-up, I’ll watch and write a series review of any one randomly selected anime (up to say 40 episodes in length) picked from a list generated of people leaving a comment at this post saying that they voted for me and the name of the anime they’d like me to review. Of course, I can’t verify if the winning person did, in fact, vote for me but I’m willing to trust in my readers. And  no matter the legitimacy of the comment, I’ll still be reviewing a show I haven’t done yet and I’ll only do it when I win so it’s a win-win for everyone involved.

Filed under: anime, general anime interst, meta/office keeping, other wallpapers and pictures

2010 promises to offer more awesomeness

I hope no one minds if I do a little jig. Not only does The Null Set turn 2 years old today, I reach such an absurdly high milestone on the same day.

Just a little jig because it still feels like I have a long way to go before becoming a master blogger and too much celebration feels out-of-place. Instead, I feel deeply indebted to everyone that’s visited, read my posts, left comments, and continue to come back. I hesitate to thank any person in particular since I’ll invariably forget someone I should thank and, of course, there’s many people who read this blog anonymously that I’d thank if I knew their names. However, I don’t want to miss this chance to thank people like Kitsune, Janette, RP, Suguru, Zzeroparticle, Panther, FuyuMaiden, Canne and Steven Den Beste for frequently leaving comments and running interesting anime blogs themselves. And other commenter’s like dodo, ray, JayyG and all the people who have commented (for some reason) on my single post about Aang the Avatar.

As of this post, I have had 341 total posts, 500,236 views, 1131 comments, and 6828 spam comments.

My top day was 1,644 views on June 26,2009 and my top week was Dec 21-27 with 8,971 views.

My top ten posts are:

Winter 2008 – 2009 Anime Preview and Watchlist … 31,444 views

Soul Eater Wallpaper … 18,769 views

Soul Eater Wallpaper 2 … 17,954 views

Haruhi vs Gurren Lagann … 16,686 views

Toradora Wallpapers … 14,277 views

Gurren Lagann Wallpaper … 13,085 views

Spring 2009 Anime Preview and Watchlist … 8,787 views

The 5 Personal Most Influential (non-anime) Animation Shows … 8,739 views

FLCL Series Review … 7,406 views

Fall 2009 Anime Preview and Watchlist … 7,360 views

Reflections and resolutions

This year saw a redesign of The Null Set and a sprucing up my About page – which I’m pleased with the outcomes of both. And I don’t foresee changing the theme/layout in the coming year nor making many big changes.

In some ways I thought The Null Set took a step back this year because I didn’t post as often and I allowed my weekly anime post series to lapse and I didn’t offer as many wallpapers created by me this year and I let my completed anime in need of a series review pile to grow to large proportions. And I’ve let this depress me over the last couple months which has squelched a lot of the enthusiasm I have had towards blogging anime. However, over the last few days as I’ve watched the anniversary approach for The Null Set I realized that for all my perceived problems I’ve still gotten almost 400,000 hits during my second year and there’s people that keep coming back to read what I write. That’s something to be happy about and I feel re-energized.

Therefore, I pledge to try my level best to make the third year of The Null Set the best yet.