T w e n t y S i d e d
I’d love to know where this came from:
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My referrers is pretty much made up of the usual suspects. RPG.net. GitP. Home on the Strange. Den Beste. Also, Netvibes, Stumbleupon, et al.
I’ve gotten some visitors from Buzz.mn, which I think is mostly due to me leaving comments at Lilek’s new blog. The biggest referrer is Bloglines, but that is most likely people coming here via their RSS aggregate-o-tron. This means that Bloglines probably isn’t a source of new readers, but an entry point for existing ones. For reasons I can’t comprehend, Livejournal doesn’t even make the top 20. Over half my readers are from LJ, and they are more prone to share a link than just about anyone else. I can only assume the way LJ gives everyone a subdomain (someuser.livejournal.com) diffuses the apparent incoming links.
Anyway, I still can’t see a reason for the spike in traffic. I know no one person knows the answer, but if you’re a new reader (or, now that I think of it, not new) I’d love to know how you found me. I’m very curious what let to the above spike. (Note that the spike is more extreme than it seems – I took the image about five days from the end of June.)
Pixel City Dev Blog
An attempt to make a good looking cityscape with nothing but simple tricks and a few rectangles of light.
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So what happens when a SOFTWARE engineer tries to review hardware? This. This happens.
Juvenile and Proud
Yes, this game is loud, crude, childish, and stupid. But it it knows what it wants to be and nails it. And that's admirable.
The Middle Ages
Would you have survived in the middle ages?
Lost Laughs in Leisure Suit Larry
Why was this classic adventure game so funny in the 80's, and why did it stop being funny?
I forget where I saw your comic referred to, but I think it was linked by one of my LiveJournal friends. It’s bookmarked now, so I just go there in the morning before reading the news.
I would bet that someone started a “forward this funny email” thread with one of your comics and a link attached. It’s amazing how fast and far those things travel.
Your direct link might also have ended up on geek email newsletters or something, also.
I think I followed a link from another blog… it’s been a while so I don’t remember. These days I come here from the RSS feed, I have that in Google Reader.
Came for the Comic, stayed for your posts :D
PS: By the way, my name will probably test your blog’s hability to handle foreign characters :-P
I ran into a friend on the street and he said “Hey check out this web page.” Sort of an analog link, if you will.
I saw several refs to DMotR in Live Journal in May, and then I told a bunch of my non-LJ friends who also then read the whole thing.
I remember quite clearly. I was visiting the official Bioware website, which isn’t something I do often to begin with, if ever, and they had a poll that went something like “What is your favorite webcomic?”. I choose one, and then looked at the other, since I figured they had to be pretty good webcomics to appear in a poll like that. DM of the Rings were in it, for whatever reason and being a DnD nerd, the name caught my eye. So I checked it out. Read through the archives, checked for updates, and began reading the rest of the blog.
I was linked to DMotR over at JournalFen, then posted a Link of the Day entry over at my journal that featured DMotR, then my flist started to spread it on as well. Viral!
Currently, I’ve got a syndicated feed of your blog on my livejournal flist, so I just click that to get here. I think you’re probably right about the subdomains killing the impact of the livejournal users.
Found you some weeks ago through a LotRO-Europe thread, where one of your tremendously funny DMotR comix was linked.
Well, next thing I know is that your side was in my RSS feed and I spend hours and hours reading the archive. I really like your rants and thoughts and DMotR never failed to make me grin.
Like probably most of your current readers, I got in through DMotR, which I found through a comic search site, can’t remember which one.
Someone posted a link a few months back at http://www.octopusoverlords.com (a primarily PC gaming forum) and I followed.
google reader now – and the original post with the link was in the beginning of may on a czech blog. when i bookmarked it on delicious, i saw i’m surely among a huge crowd :)
I’m a new reader, and I came via the Fear the Boot tabletop RPG podcast. And like some other readers, I came for the comic and stayed for the posts.
It was your Fear the Boot interview for me. They were getting such a kick out of DMotR, I thought I’d check it out. Been here ever since.
Apparently their forwarding is down, so my link to Fear the Boot didn’t work. So here’s a working link: http://feartheboot.libsyn.com/
Word of mouth for me. A friend sent me a link to DMotR. Been a regular visitor for comic and in general for a couple of months.
I found you through StumbeUpon…I think.
I’ve been reading for a while. Love the site! The comic, the writings, the old campaign….pretty much inclusive really! Keep up the good work so I’ll have something to read.
Google Reader now, originally I think it was one of your programming links (the elevation one perhaps) I saw on digg, or somewhere else, or it might have just searching through google.
I like OOTS. And a Co-worker told me that that this comic was similarly funny last may. So I hooked it up to my RSS feed and have been keeping track ever since.
Word of mouth… I was referrerd by one of my friends, and through the Majikqal Powers of Google, I tracked the site down.
I’m one of the guys who followed a link you left at buzz.mn. Pure serendipity. I rarely read comments, and I think this might only be the third time in five years that I’ve followed a link someone left in a comment section. I’m very glad I did, though. I’ve got you bookmarked now, and I hit your site every time I open my daily bookmark folder in tabs.
Another one through LiveJournal.
Referral from a friend a couple weeks back. Went through the archives, and have been checking the site daily since.
There’s a forum for local gamers I visit a lot. A while ago someone made a post talking about webcomics, and eventually someone posted a link to DMoTR. Now, I read everything you post.
I first came here when DM of the Rings was featured on Attack of the Show. Then I discovered the section on the D&D campaign, got hooked and bookmarked the page. I’m still stuck on the comic, but I love reading the posts on RPGs.
I actually came here through the Neverwinter Nights 2 forums. But that was mostly someone using one of your blogs as an example of why she/he didn’t like NWN2.
I found your link on our LOTRO Kinship forum.
Word of mouth, and I subscribe to your feed now. I’ve gone through your archives and “Best of” posts. Of course, also have read each comic.
You told me about it.
I think I must have seen it in a forum post, but I can’t recall which.
I was referred to it by the wonderful people over at Rinkworks. I found the comic hilarious, even though I’ve never played a single roleplaying game in my life, and once I got caught up, I started reading your other posts. Love the site!
Ummm. At least a couple months ago. There was probably a thread about this in the giantitp.com forums. I went there for Erfworld.
Through stumbleupon, months ago. As far as stories go, stumbleupon is kind of a boring one.
Hmmm… April 4th was a good day for RPG comics. A friend from college sent a link ([url]http://www.shamusyoung.com/twentysidedtale/?p=1061[/url]) to a mailing list I’m on (it’s a very niche list: People who had user accounts on the UF VAX during the ’90s or so) saying “I swear I’ve gamed with these guys before” The same day, xkcd had a very funny RPG-related comic ([url]http://xkcd.com/c244.html[/url]. I haven’t entirely gone through the DMotR archive yet, but I have been a regular reader of the blog ever since.
I was referred by a friend. But your DMotR is mentioned prominently over on the WotC forums (Redegar’s Repository) in a thread about running a 3e LotR campaign. I believe I’ve also seen it pop up on ENWorld. Those may be your usual suspects though.
I ran across it from (I think) one of your comments on a James Lileks article on buzz.mn.
I’m pretty sure I got here off of a Ferrett recommendation.
I “discovered” DMoR in December and told a bunch of friends about it at that time. Once I was all caught up, I stopped reading for a few months, then came back in late May to catch up again. (I like to read a lot at a time, rather than just one every few days.) At that time, I told all those original friends about it again, plus a few more people. I was even more enthusiastic the second time because I was amazed that the quality hadn’t suffered at all and you hadn’t run out of ideas. I also started reading the rest of your blog around that time too and was recommending the whole thing, not just the strip.
I found your site thanks to the mind control rays from the satellite you have in orbit…err…was I not supposed to say that?
Nodwick! I’m pretty sure I found you through a link from Aaron Williams.
That or the atellite-say. *wink wink*
I found your website about nine months ago after a referral for the DM of the Rings on the Castlemolds forum. If you haven’t checked out Bruce’s molds, you really should. They are of excellent quality, the mold community is very active and you can make amazing scenery for role playing games.
Since that time, I have been sending more and more people your way. Thanks for helping make the internet an even more additive place.
Word of mouth (well, over messenger, but same thing) for me, but then I started reading about a month and a half ago
Older brothers are wonderful people. They share hilarious webcomics.
I think I found you through a posting at rec.arts.comics.strips in March.
I’m another one of those guys who saw you on Attack of the Show.
I found your site through journalfen a few months back. I’ve also seen it mentioned elsewhere.
I wandered over because someone i play “Lord of the Rings Online” with, posted a link to our Kinship/guild forums.
As i recall, i think i’ve also seen a link posted to the official Turbine forums for the game too… but it could have just been the Euro-forums as another reader posted above.
I came here from Sensible Erection (totally not worksafe, but a great community blog nontheless). Your entry.
I think I found you from a DenBeste link, though I’m not sure because I don’t read him very often.
Heck Shamus, the creators of D&D 3.0 read your comic and have talked about it on their message boards.
I got my link in email from a friend, and I…CAN’T…STOP…READING…TOO…MUCH…FUNNY.
As for your post about others not doing the same scheme for other movies…it’s because your loyal readers are dreaming of what you’ll do when this movie ends. I’m thinking Arby’s…no something else entirely. Indiana Jones maybe? Diehard? Oh, so many cheesy movies for Shamus to GM.
The husband-to-be implied that reading Twenty Sided was a prerequisite … I’ve been ready daily ever since! That would have been March 2007. I’m loving it!
Well, I have bee reading here for a long time….but I’m pretty sure I got here through StumbleUpon.
On June 7th one of the rec.games.roguelike.nethack (r.g.r.n.) regulars posted a YANR (yet another nethack reference) article linking to the comic strip titled “Hack, and also Slash”.
For what it’s worth, r.g.r.n gets a great deal of traffic. Google groups lists 1,325 subscribers, and that’s probably a small fraction of the audience. As far as I can tell, most regulars access r.g.r.n. via a more traditional usenet newsfeed.
There’s also been some DMotR chatter in various nethack-related IRC channels.
-cdi
wildweasel posted a link to DMotR on his Blaugh! a while back and, well, here I am. Originally, I just checked this site for the comic, but sometime around April or May-ish I mainly checked it to read the blog itself.
I found out about this place from a good friend that I work with. I then spread the word to all my friends. Then I posted a link on a fantasy writer’s forum I visit at Runboard.com, then at least one of those people I told put it on their blog as so on and so forth. (I posted the link at the end of May or beginning of June)
I followed a link from Den Beste a looooong time ago.
I’m a new reader this month, and I got referred to DM of the Rings by a gaming friend. I liked it, so I read the rest of it and stuck around. I doubt I’m single-handedly responsible for the spike, but I’ve been pretty much working my way through the entire archive.
Fear the boot for me.
I was searching for help with campaign building. That led me to your documented campaign, which then led me to your general blog, and your comic.
I don’t remember exactly where I came to your site from, but I read Home on the Strange, so that seems likely.
ENWorld and LiveJournal here. I have a link to DMotR in my .sig for ENWorld and in my favorite links on LJ.
I came to the site when it was posted in chat regarding DMotR. There’s about 3-5 of us at least that now follow the comic regularly. While checking for updates I’ve read some of the other blogs that have cought my eye and now I find myself checking the site just about every day.
I got the link from my husband, then promptly pointed nearly everyone I knew to it ;)
I got here through one of your posts at buzz.mn. I immediately emailed the link to my son (who was sitting at the computer next to me) and he immediately emailed it to his dad (who uses the same computer). I’m pretty sure my husband emailed it to all of his D&D buddies. I have no idea who they have emailed it to. It has fanned out a bit though!
This was about a month ago. So yeah, it fits in with your stats. :)
I found this comic through a geeky comics thread on SuicideGirls.com a few months ago.
I have been reading for quite awhile, but haven’t posted. I found this site with stumbled upon.
It’s global warming, man. That’s the spike.
I was referred around Christmas-time by a friend/coworker who correctly thought I would find the comic amusing. I know I’ve sent a few people links and so on, though certainly not enough to account for your spike. Also, planning to do some of my Christmas shopping at your cafeepress store.
Someone posted a link during a discussion over at SJGames.com’s forums.
They linked one of the pages which was relevant to the discussion and I’ve been checking in ever since.
AOSHQ linked you a while back, and that’s how I got here. I’ve also pointed my D&D group here several times.
I don’t comment from work (I took today off), which is why I haven’t commented here previously. But I love the strip and it frequently makes me laugh out loud. I like the comments, too, especially the time the commenters got into a discussion about Gandalf being a celestial outsider.
Sluggy, Schlock Mercenary, xkcd, and OotS are the other comics I read regularly, so you’re in good company. I used to read 8-Bit Theater, but lost track of it a while back and haven’t caught up yet.
StumbleUpon brought me to a few comics. Hit up an RSS feed and found the blog that way too. Been reading everything ever since! :D
Just thought I’d throw a noncomic one in. It was the terrain project that brought me in although I can’t remember how I found that. Anyway, thanks for all the good stuff.
You get mentioned over on the Dungeons and Dragons Online boards every so often.
Mrs. Peel – We have strangely similar reading habits, including AoSHQ (though I can’t seem to get into Schlock Mercenary).
I was linked by a friend through MSN.
DMotR was mentioned at a regular D&D game a couple weeks ago by a fellow who knows the huge LotR thing I have. I must say, your strip has been bang on, like you were at the same table as me these many years.
Came for the comic, stayed for the rest.
I know that for my part, I linked it to a few friends via teamspeak, and passed it onto my guild in WoW via direct link, so, mysterious connections abound!
I have been reading your site since about the 10th episode of DM of the Rings. I was referred by a guy in my game group who was telling us how funny the comic was.
I quickly learned to:
1 – Not read DM of the rings at work and
2 – If I am reading DM of the Rings at work then be very careful about answering the phone.
I just about choked myself by tring to answer the phone and not laugh. I had read one of the early ones that was really funny. I have told a few friends about it just because, there is some really cleaver stuff on here.
I found DM of the Rings through http://www.lotrspoofs.net in early June, when number CIX (Give Peace a Chance) was the latest. I’ve been checking for updates every day since.
June… So I was one of the guys that contributed to the spike. :D
I’ve been reading DMotR since episode… 10? I think? It’s been a long time. Anyway, I believe I came across this site when someone on the Paizo.com messageboards listed their favorite webcomics. That must’ve been at least a year ago, probably close to 2.
I found out about this site from a topic on the P&P board at GameFAQ’s. That board is a relative ghost town though, with about 30 active users, and only rarely sees any new blood.
I’d guess that you’re starting to get a lot of word-of-mouth references. I’ve seen links to the comic on four Usenet groups and one mailing list so far.
I got the link to the DMoTR stuff from mates on the lord of the rings mmo :)
I came through a link from Treasure Tables, a roleplaying blog: http://www.treasuretables.org/2006/10/dm-of-the-rings-full-of-gming-insights-and-hilarious
Like many others, I found the comic very funny and intelligent and then learned that most of your other posts are interesting too.
I didn’t read all of the above comments, so maybe someone else pointed this out, but the increase in traffic may simply not be traceable to a single or even a few major sites. As is the way of the internet, one person tells two friends and they each tell two friends, etc…
This is exactly the kind of response that viral marketing firms PRAY for when they put up some random youtube video of a kitten digging a hole that turns out to be a magical portal to PlaystationLand. You may have stumbled on this type of response for free.
It might be interesting to throw some custom code at your log files and count the number of different SITES that are referring traffic, rather than simply looking at the top 20 or whatever, which is what most pre-built traffic analyzers do. See how many referers you had last month vs this month. A cool function might even break it down daily and chart the results. If it shows up as an exponential curve then you are definitely dealing with a viral linking phenomenon.
It was mentioned by a commenter on Wil Wheaton’s blog a while back, which is how I found it. I have sent a number of readers from my blog as well, and word of mouth works great!
I don’t remember where I saw the link, but I recced it in my LJ on June 5th, and I know that at least two others linked from mine. As have so many others, I came for the LOTR, and stayed to read the rest via RSS.
GitP forums led me here. I believe it was the strip where Aragormless got lucky. I think the thread I was reading was Belkar’s Romantic Interest.
Hi,
Ran Prieur posted a link several months ago at ranprieur.com. Now I show up for the new comics whenever they’re posted and occasionally read your other stuff.
I found you through a link on someone else’s LJ… umm, months ago. I don’t remember exactly when. I’ve linked from my journal at least twice since then and I think three times. Nothing in June, though.
Angie
I think I came here through the Buzz a few weeks ago, if I remember correctly, and eventually caught up on the DMotR. I use Google Reader now though.
I’m another one who was referred by TheFerrett. I think it was a couple of months ago now, and I can’t remember if it was his livejournal or a link on Home On The Strange though. Now I keep tabs on your site with Google Reader.
I found you in October .. or September.. not really sure how.. maybe something to do with NWN2.. which I still haven’t gotten due to video card needs.. besides.. NWN1 is an awsome tool.. huh uh huh.. I said tool.. huh uh huh uh huh huh uh uh uh huh.
Anyway.. been hooked up daily with RSS .. told some friends via a “you gotta see this” e-mail.. Don’t know if any of them stuck.
As others have said, you were posted to Sensible Erection mid-June. I read the whole thing through in a weekend, then added you to Google Reader.
I just started visiting this page last month and got entirely addicted, so I guess I am a part of the spike. I heard about your comic through word of mouth, from one of my gaming buddies.
Our gaming group’s DM linked the comic to me many moons ago, and I read every single episode since then.
Came for the comic, stayed for the posts.
Now, it’s on Google Reader RSS.
I got here a while ago from a link in the General Discussion thread of roleplayinggames.net
I found your site form Flashflashrevolution.com, where the membership is 1,000,000 strong and the forum users 100,000 strong. Your comic was linked there a couple months back though.
your in the credits of a spike video, thats what got me here. http://www.spikedhumor.com/articles/71778/Roller_Coaster_Tycoon_Slaughter.html
I found your great comic via the Irregular Webcomic forum.
I came here through a link on Slashdot, I think http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=228157&cid=18488551
Argh, where’s the preview button, Shamus?
Someone posted the link to this site on our World of Warcraft forum, well a link to the comic anyway :)
Love the comic, nice job!
I was referred by a friend back in April or May (I think). Since then I’ve referred a few other friends and, oddly, been referred by about three more friends again. They seem a tad disappointed when I tell them that I’ve been reading it for months.
I mentioned this before, but The Lord of the Rings Online was released in late april and a lot of the fan sites and forum posts link to you. :)
Id love to tell you the source but it would violate against the Rule 1 and 2 of the site… Sorry… :D
You posted a comment on wil Wheaton’s blog, I followed the link from there. Now I use Live Bookmarks (RSS) in Firefox.
Someone posted about you in rp_discuss at livejournal, I think. At least, I can’t think of another way I got here
Well… I have one possible explanation:
Nethack turned 20, so geeks all over the world went YAY! And a link to this: http://www.shamusyoung.com/twentysidedtale/?p=1080
was posted on the Userfriendly Messageboard (ars.userfriendly.org). I won’t rummage through it now just to find that link, but that’s how I got here. I laughed my ass off, told some of my geek friends, they told theirs…
To sum it up:
Nethack players = true RPG players ->
Twenty Sided = true RPG Humor ->
Match found
Heya Shamus :)
I tuned in about 2 weeks ago after a Warcraft guildie posted a link to your AWESOME site. I spent about the entire day getting caught up, and now tune in any time my RSS reader tells me there’s more to see. Thanks for keeping me laughing!
I heard about your site from a friend in a IM conversation some time ago. Perhaps in the last days of May or so.
I might be one tiny reason for the hits boost: I’ve been having a lot of trouble with your RSS feed. It tells me that there’s X amount of new posts but doesn’t load up the feed so I have to type “http://shamusyoung.com/twentysidedtale/” each time you post something. If other people are having the same problem, there’s a small clue. But that’s one big spike!
Word of mouth. I do believe you hit some level of critical mass and have officially become an internet grassroots phenom. I heard about you from a friend one day and then within a week I heard about you from several different sources. (I am part of the June spike btw)
I’m one of those people who heard about it on Attack of the Show on G4. While I may have cam for the comic, I
As one of the spikers, the DM of the Rings webcomic just recently hit via non-computerized word of mouth the circuit of interconnected gaming groups that includes the makers of the cult film “The Gamers” (www.deadgentlemen.com) and a number of gamers who work at Wizards of the Coast. That’s how I heard about it, and I personally introduced at least a dozen others in the last month. I would imagine that the large analog network of gamers in Seattle and California may have something to do with the spike.
You got the users from Fear the Boot.
School let out. That might be why?
Two words: Critical Mass.
It’s what happens when the exponential curve of “word of mouth” publicity suddenly turns for the vertical.
At least, that’s the Occam’s razor explanation.
Here’s an interesting blog by Scott Kurtz (PVP) about the pitfalls of webcomic success. (link to page 1)
http://www.pvponline.com/rants_success1.php3
I don’t know if any of it applies to you, but it’s a good read from a guy who transitioned from a “hobbyist” class web-cartoonist to a “professional.”
It’s the kind of thing that leaves lesser minds muttering about “micro-payments” and whatnot.
Enjoy.
I stumbled across your blog while doing some online research for my new campaign. Fell in love with the DM of the Rings and made it one f the few links on our game site. I doubt I’ve had noticeable effect on your traffic, but I have sent the link out to a few hundred people…..
I know of a stat counter which tells you where people are coming from. Try http://www.statcounter.com – it is free. You can upload for more detailed information though.
I came here to read the LoTR comic, then I liked everything else in here.
I came here via a message board I hang out on called The Ebolter Inn. I think the guy who posted the link got it from the Lord of the Rings online forums. Great comics, btw, as a ex-D&D player and long time fantasy fan I think they’re hilarious.
Regular reader/poster, but I wouldn’t be surprised if your argument with the Themepark Tycoon Bowling Death Ride plagurist on YouTube has something to do with it.
Since you said you’d like to know where your new readers are coming from…originally I found the link on Fandom_Wank, a community on JournalFen, and have been keeping up with it since then. Usually I just type in the URL directly.
A few months ago, a LiveJournal friend posted about the comic. I cursed him for giving me another addiction, bookmarked the ‘site, and then stopped reading my webcomics list (again). I saw a mention of it a week or so ago, on, you guessed it, LiveJournal, and thought, “Hey, I have a bookmark to that! I need to read all of them still!” Now my husband and I are fighting over the computer so that we can get caught up on it. He’s at 65, I think, and I’m back on 50. While I’ve got temporary control of the computer, I need to pass him.;-)
Somebody mentioned it on a message board on Wizards or Paizo, can’t remember exactly,
I’ve since passed it on to almost everyone with a “gamer/nerd/geek” bone in their body…
Well, if you look at the URL for my website, yeah, that’s how Live Journal domains work. :)
(Wondering now if you look at my subdomain, how many hits you have for today?)
I originally came here from the Mirth Canal over at pointlesswasteoftime.com
I found one of the DMotR comics via StumbleUpon. I backtracked and read the archives, then stayed around for the rest of the site.
I don’t know about June, but I know I found your site posted on LOTRO’s forums. I think I started reading back in March.
I found you back in december of last year, I believe it was via a friend’s LJ link. I linked to you in January both on my LJ and on our gaming group’s forum.
Add another one for “Link from Den Beste”. From a long time ago, like Spring 2006. I’m a long time den Beste reader and kept checking him when he stopped USS Clueless.
Someone on the GitP forums linked here. Or, possibly, they mentioned “DM of the Rings,” which spurred me to search the site out.
Anyway, it was around when Aragorn et al met Eomer. I think it’s the one where you suggested a campaign where everyone has names in the vernacular, rather than fantasy names that everyone forgets.
I actually found this googling for shadowrun and orc. So maybe part of it is that you’re getting to be a high ranking google site, so that when people are looking for only slightly related stuff they find you.
I’ve spread the word though.
Friend gave me the link to your comic, and I started reading the archives.
I’m NOT reading through all this! So I’ll just say that Wikimedia links to you to illustrate some points in webcomic tropes and table top RPG (That is how I found you)
I found it through a link on theonering.net