As I have said many many times, I don’t care one bit about the amount of people who read the Saker blog. I do care only about the quality of the readership, not its quantity. Simply put: I want to reach the right people. Besides, since I have no ads, no pop-ups, no special memberships, no for pay only articles, etc. the number of visitors also makes no difference to our finances either. About once a year, I ask our webmaster how we are doing, and his reply has always (so far) been “same as before, no changes”.
Today I am going to break that rule to convey something I think will interest the entire Saker community. But first, in this context, I want to mention two groups of people very hostile to the blog and me personally:
- Those who left the Saker blog in anger/rage over something I wrote or posted, and who explain to me in endless “divorce letters” that they, and many many MANY others are now also leaving the Saker blog in disgust.
- There are small and mostly irrelevant websites out there who want to become visible and, in order to achieve that, they “bark up” the Saker blog and even me personally. Their transparent hope is that picking a fight with me will eventually gain some visibility.
As you know, I totally ignore both of these groups, primarily because I couldn’t care less about them and their illiterate tactics.
Yesterday, however, I got an email from Ron Unz’ mailing list which mentioned the (excellent) ranking of the Unz Review so I took a look. Below I will reproduce the full table published by Ron:
But first I want to say that I find these results quite amazing, to be honest. There are 70 websites listed here, including a few “super top-dogs” with truly phenomenal figures. The Unz Review is in position number 10, which is very good indeed. The Saker blog is much lower, in 26th position with only about 1/4th of the Unz readership. But then, look further below as some results are truly quite amazing. The Saker blog outranks major websites like (in order): SPLC, Moon of Alabama, Off Guardian, Voltairenet, Current Affairs, Strategic Culture, Veterans Today, VDare, Commentary Magazine, Paul Craig Roberts, Harpers Magazine, Nation of Islam, Antiwar.com, Op Ed News, Consortium News, Anti-Empire, Conter-Currents, Information Clearinghouse, Chronicles Magazine, the Duran and Russia Insider.
Did you expect that??
I sure did not! In fact, I had no idea at all :-)
Before I continue, now please look at this table again and, especially carefully, at the actual figures shown:
Publication | Total Pages | Total Visits | Total Hours | Bounce% | Tm/V | Pgs/V |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
The Daily Caller | 18,295,600 | 8,630,000 | 349,994 | 58 | 2:26 | 2.12 |
National Review | 14,249,700 | 6,390,000 | 268,025 | 62 | 2:31 | 2.23 |
The Daily Stormer | 9,408,500 | 1,550,000 | 120,986 | 33 | 4:41 | 6.07 |
Alternet | 6,310,900 | 2,830,000 | 208,319 | 51 | 4:25 | 2.23 |
LewRockwell | 5,708,400 | 2,130,000 | 178,683 | 45 | 5:02 | 2.68 |
Reason Magazine | 4,959,400 | 2,740,000 | 105,033 | 69 | 2:18 | 1.81 |
Unherd | 4,816,000 | 2,800,000 | 58,333 | 68 | 1:15 | 1.72 |
The Intercept | 4,768,400 | 3,640,000 | 66,733 | 80 | 1:06 | 1.31 |
American Greatness | 4,684,800 | 2,440,000 | 105,733 | 66 | 2:36 | 1.92 |
The Unz Review | 4,403,200 | 1,720,000 | 113,233 | 46 | 3:57 | 2.56 |
Global Research | 3,822,000 | 1,560,000 | 91,867 | 59 | 3:32 | 2.45 |
Foreign Policy | 3,593,400 | 3,390,000 | 62,150 | 76 | 1:06 | 1.06 |
The American Conservative | 3,377,500 | 1,930,000 | 62,725 | 69 | 1:57 | 1.75 |
Marginal Revolution | 3,374,100 | 1,630,000 | 90,556 | 63 | 3:20 | 2.07 |
American Renaissance | 3,303,239 | 832,050 | 85,747 | 36 | 6:11 | 3.97 |
Jacobin Magazine | 2,949,200 | 2,020,000 | 41,522 | 73 | 1:14 | 1.46 |
Asia Times | 2,937,600 | 1,360,000 | 42,311 | 63 | 1:52 | 2.16 |
Signs of the Times | 2,927,400 | 1,190,000 | 65,119 | 54 | 3:17 | 2.46 |
The Nation | 2,567,000 | 1,510,000 | 32,297 | 69 | 1:17 | 1.70 |
Counter-Currents | 2,462,782 | 818,200 | 49,547 | 58 | 3:38 | 3.01 |
CounterPunch | 2,430,761 | 913,820 | 64,475 | 55 | 4:14 | 2.66 |
The New Republic | 2,243,600 | 1,420,000 | 23,272 | 77 | 0:59 | 1.58 |
Rense.com | 2,087,800 | 1,430,000 | 48,064 | 79 | 2:01 | 1.46 |
World Socialist Website | 2,004,000 | 1,200,000 | 27,667 | 75 | 1:23 | 1.67 |
Storm Front | 1,929,083 | 293,620 | 26,263 | 43 | 5:22 | 6.57 |
The Vineyard of the Saker | 1,712,551 | 774,910 | 39,391 | 46 | 3:03 | 2.21 |
Quillette | 1,693,855 | 973,480 | 23,526 | 72 | 1:27 | 1.74 |
SPLC | 1,638,665 | 905,340 | 21,376 | 75 | 1:25 | 1.81 |
Naked Capitalism | 1,604,259 | 739,290 | 54,831 | 43 | 4:27 | 2.17 |
Moon of Alabama | 1,600,654 | 744,490 | 31,020 | 53 | 2:30 | 2.15 |
The Right Stuff | 1,597,050 | 491,400 | 14,060 | 48 | 1:43 | 3.25 |
Takimag | 1,593,019 | 504,120 | 36,269 | 38 | 4:19 | 3.16 |
The Grayzone | 1,457,526 | 694,060 | 14,460 | 56 | 1:15 | 2.10 |
Tablet Magazine | 1,410,395 | 986,290 | 17,534 | 73 | 1:04 | 1.43 |
Off Guardian | 1,351,818 | 693,240 | 20,990 | 55 | 1:49 | 1.95 |
Voltairenet | 1,335,040 | 596,000 | 17,714 | 61 | 1:47 | 2.24 |
Current Affairs | 1,246,495 | 532,690 | 18,644 | 74 | 2:06 | 2.34 |
Strategic Culture | 1,223,235 | 390,810 | 17,912 | 56 | 2:45 | 3.13 |
Veterans Today | 1,170,117 | 430,190 | 19,239 | 46 | 2:41 | 2.72 |
VDare | 1,137,741 | 404,890 | 28,680 | 40 | 4:15 | 2.81 |
The Baffler | 1,062,389 | 508,320 | 16,803 | 65 | 1:59 | 2:09 |
Commentary Magazine | 1,022,868 | 473,550 | 27,098 | 58 | 3:26 | 2.16 |
Renegade Tribune | 943,550 | 331,070 | 22,347 | 63 | 4:03 | 2.85 |
Paul Craig Roberts | 850,885 | 429,740 | 16,593 | 62 | 2:19 | 1.98 |
Red Ice | 837,111 | 412,370 | 12,027 | 47 | 1:45 | 2.03 |
Harpers | 810,621 | 460,580 | 8,956 | 75 | 1:10 | 1.76 |
Nation of Islam | 794,597 | 249,090 | 8,165 | 57 | 1:58 | 3.19 |
Antiwar.com | 717,735 | 335,390 | 17,981 | 63 | 3:13 | 2.14 |
CounterCurrents.org | 687,412 | 287,620 | 3,915 | 66 | 0:49 | 2.39 |
Information Clearinghouse | 586,421 | 270,240 | 16,214 | 57 | 3:36 | 2.17 |
MintPress News | 489,669 | 335,390 | 6,335 | 74 | 1:08 | 1.46 |
Op Ed News | 454,195 | 95,620 | 8,526 | 53 | 5:21 | 4.75 |
Consortium News | 445,335 | 269,900 | 5,473 | 63 | 1:13 | 1.65 |
Anti-Empire | 430,508 | 235,250 | 3,725 | 44 | 0:57 | 1.83 |
Chronicles Magazine | 379,891 | 197,860 | 4,947 | 59 | 1:30 | 1.92 |
National Justice | 356,126 | 217,150 | 5,670 | 62 | 1:34 | 1.64 |
Culture Wars | 352,121 | 63,790 | 1,311 | 42 | 1:14 | 5.52 |
Occidental Observer | 329,351 | 136,660 | 5,390 | 56 | 2:22 | 2.41 |
Occidental Dissent | 311,018 | 139,470 | 7,632 | 53 | 3:17 | 2.23 |
MondoWeiss | 307,693 | 203,770 | 3,453 | 72 | 1:01 | 1.51 |
In These Times | 292,179 | 205,760 | 3,658 | 76 | 1:04 | 1.42 |
The Duran | 251,018 | 102,040 | 4,138 | 45 | 2:26 | 2.46 |
Tom Woods | 233,677 | 104,320 | 5,998 | 55 | 3:27 | 2.24 |
TomDispatch | 203,745 | 72,250 | 3,633 | 52 | 3:01 | 2.82 |
Dissident Voice | 192,170 | 112,380 | 2,466 | 60 | 1:19 | 1.71 |
Russia Insider | 174,818 | 89,650 | 4,209 | 56 | 2:49 | 1.95 |
IHR | 117,522 | 71,660 | 1,274 | 76 | 1:04 | 1.64 |
TruthDig | 107,814 | 62,320 | 1,800 | 66 | 1:44 | 1.73 |
WhoWhatWhy | N/A | N/A | N/A | N/A | N/A | N/A |
This table shows a lot of interesting things:
- In spite of all the categorical statements of Saker-haters, the blog’s readership is not only stable, it is excellent in both quality AND quantity.
- The departure (and “divorce letters”) from those who were mad at me for crimethink or the blog’s “censorship” had zero effect on the blog.
- We can be sure that some of the owners websites ranking lower than the Saker are sick with envy (remember that their websites are all about ad revenue and/or “sponsors”!) and are desperate to gain at least some visibility or relevance by trying to bark up the Saker blog.
- No wonder the anti-COVID and anti-vaxx crusaders are so pissed that I refused to jump on their bandwagon: had I endorsed their ideology and agenda it would have given them a major PR boost. Instead, I told them to get lost with absolutely no negative consequences whatsoever for myself or the blog.
- Those websites who sold out to specific interests (be it Alt-Q, the Papacy, the Kremlin, CIA PSYOPs, Russian oligarchs, etc.) are not doing that well at all, in spite of the money they got in exchange for their honesty and souls.
- The same goes for the many clickbaiters out there (Veterans Today is a perfect example) who in spite of their ridiculous article and titles don’t seem to be able to attract many readers. This is excellent news indeed, as clickbaiters are not only dishonorable, but also rather dangerous.
- Blogs with no money but with brains do better than blogs with no brains but money. The perfect example is the excellent score of Moon of Alabama compared to, say, the pathetic score of The Duran.
Now I have an admission to make. While I really don’t care at all about the blogs which did not score as well as the Saker blog, to outrank VDare, Antiwar and the SPLC at the same time makes me feel warm all over :-)
One more important note: US IT corporations have all deranked the Saker blog. You can verify that yourself by entering a few keywords you have seen in a Saker blog title, and then compare the results of, say Google or Bing with the results from, say, DuckDuckGo or Yandex. The reason why we could survive such a deranking rather painlessly is not only because we don’t depend on ad revenue, but because we get most of our readers by means of word of mouth and not by depending on ANY corporation.
Likewise, the fact that the Saker blog TOTALLY and ONLY depends on 100% volunteer donations protects us from being suddenly defunded by anyone. This is a protection which only TRUE crowdsourcing can offer.
Now the bad news, obviously, is this: the Saker blog and I myself have made a lot of enemies over the years (perfect example here). The fact that all the efforts of our enemies to harm the blog (or me personally) have failed – I ignore them on principle – only further enrages them. Some have thrown in the towel, given up and quietly died (Fort-Russ) while others are still trying, but all they are actually achieving is damaging their own reputation. If they were capable of producing real, interesting, analyses, they would have no need to trash others (for example, Bernhard at MoA never felt the need to trash anybody and his blog is doing superbly well, especially for a true “one man show”!).
One last note. Here is what such rankings do NOT include:
- The separate Saker Community blog (at https://saker.community/)
- The five other language Saker blogs: French, Italian, Latin American (Spanish+Portuguese), Russian and Serbian
- The spontaneous translations made by independent volunteers (in all sorts of languages)
- The YouTube channels which some of these blogs also have
- The reprints of our articles both in the West and now very regularly in Russia
Again, not that this is of any importance, but I can only imagine what REAL figures the Saker Community as a whole would have if all the resources of our community would be counted together!
Finally, one caveat: I don’t know how/where Ron got his numbers. I am sure that Ron being both intellectually honest and IT-savvy did not make them up and that he got them from a credible source/method. Maybe from Alexa web ranking? Again, since rankings and quantitative criteria are irrelevant to me, I don’t really know (or care). I trust Ron’s honesty and skills. But I have to warn the readers that I cannot personally vouch for the accuracy of these numbers. They seem credible to me and match with what I have seen over the years, but that is only my best guess. So caveat emptor!
Having said that, I want to conclude with a humongous BRAVO!!! and THANK YOU!!! for all those who made the above possible and who still are making it possible today. As I wrote in my mini-biography, “It was never about me, but always about you“. That is still 100% true today. It is only thanks to you and your support (not only donations, but also all the many other forms of support, from kind emails, to prayers, to guest contributions, to organizational support, to moderation, IT-work, translations and everything else!!) that the Saker Blog survived for 15 years without ever sacrificing any of our principles under any circumstances, no matter how hard and, at times, even painful: the loss of trust and respect for individuals I once considered as true friends and fellow allies in the same cause is, by far, the worst and most painful aspect of all this for me. I try to accept that as coming with the territory, but each such backstabbing and hypocrisy still hurts every time (especially coming from people and websites I once helped a great deal to launch and publicize). But, over the years, at least it hurts a little less each time. I think this is progress, however humble.
The bottom line is this: I would never, ever, been able to achieve even a small fraction of this immense work had it not been for the help and support from so many wonderful people, especially in the tough times.
Now that we stand on the edge of the abyss and that we know even less than ever what tomorrow will bring, I wanted to indulge in this little bit of shameless self-congratulatory backslapping and high-fiving with all of you, the entire Saker Community and my friends and allies, while there is still time to celebrate.
I will now take the rest of the day off to spend some time recharging my batteries before the proverbial crapola hits the fan, either tomorrow or in the near future. And, who knows? God is merciful, maybe this time around He will save us from ourselves (again!)?
Hugs and cheers to all,
Andrei
“4. No wonder the anti-COVID and anti-vaxx crusaders are so pissed that I refused to jump on their bandwagon: […]”
Yes, this is a subject on which I completely disagree with you, but I couldn’t care less about that.
To stay up-to-date about the unfolding Covid 9/11 crisis, I read other trusted experts in this field (Robert Malone, Michael Yeadon, Chris Martenson, Front Line COVID-19 Critical Care Alliance (FLCCC), America’s Frontline Doctors (AFLDS), etc.).
I read your blog to stay up-to-date on the unfolding crisis in Ukraine, because, to me, you are a trusted expert in this field (as is Paul Craig Robberts and as was the late Stephan Cohen).
So yes, Andrei: stay clear from this Covid Pandemonium; it’s not your core subject and you don’t have the necessary qualifications to say anything authoritative about it.
But please do continue to teach and update us on the dangerous military and geo-political developments between the Anglo-Zionist Empire and its NATO-stan lackeys, and Russia and China and their allies. Because these are the fields in which you ARE qualified to speak up.
Congratulations Saker
Your site has become the go to for me concerning international news and events. Although I live in a ” free” society, Sweden that is, its media is completely owned by one publishing company, which I shall not name.
The same goes for Denmark, it used to have a leftist newspaper, Information, established during the occupation of Denmark, but the paper has lost its edge, and have become mainstream leftist (sigh).
Anyway I deeply appreciate your blog and your insight and foremost you will to speak out against mainstream views. And I gladly add UNZ also.
…sjajan posao radite. svaka cast.
If what has happened really was completely unimportant to this site then why write a lengthy article to stress that it had no apparent effect? It seems to me that clearly it did have an impact and maybe viewership has recovered a bit with the latest round of geopolitical bickering. I personally know of several people, myself included, who have mostly turned their back on this blog since 2020.
I do think this is what independent media should be about, however, that people choose the authors they wish to consume and that they feel espouse truth. Unlike being forced to pay for state sponsored media as happens in many European countries. Anyway I will not express my disappointment here any further because I don’t think it will pass moderation.
Andrei,
This is well-merited recognition. I have assiduously followed the blog since Maidan in 2014 as I could see that YewCrane was going to be a suppurating ulcer for years to come. You have given us information since then that we would not get anywhere else, plus the standard of commentary from very knowledgeable people is absolutely first class. I live in the UK and the volume of utter bilious hatred from the MSM here has to be seen and heard to be believed. It’s at a crescendo now, right across the the piece, and it defies logic. Russia is five countries away and has never done us harm, as in it has never attacked us. Other European countries have, within living memory, and we have cordial relations with them – now. I think the capitalist class here have designs on the treasure house that is Siberia, and the fact that they can’t loot it at will is driving them insane. The YewCrane thing is not yet played out, I think the best is yet to come. All of you keep up the good work, as an antidote to the drivel we get from the press here.
I’m certain if the other blogs have the same quality, high standard, integrity and respect to all faiths and ethnicities as The Saker’s, The Saker would have been on the top by a high margin. The pyramid highest at the narrowest top.
Thank you Andrei for being voice of reason and the logical down to earth analysis, the choice of topics and writers. Also, thanks to Amaranth, Auslander and Larchmont for their input and being watchful of those who don’t meet the standard.
God bless all
I used to be able to type into my search engine (the decentralised, peer to peer, meta-search engine Searx which aggregates results from more than 70 search services) the single word ‘Saker’ and it brought this site up at the top of the list.
For the past month or so, even if I add the word ‘vineyard’, it likewise does not bring up this site anywhere near the top. I have to type the whole enchilada ‘Vineyard of the Saker’ to achieve that. Can’t think what might be happening…
“the loss of trust and respect for individuals I once considered as true friends and fellow allies in the same cause is, by far, the worst and most painful aspect of all this for me.”
Short time to read & post. Sorry if redundant comment, Quote tells us that integrity was always there. People know what is missing in their lives and it is close connection. In the midst of a conversation taking a big breath and knowing that you are in this together with a team that has your back.
Playing any game on line for hours does not get you this feeling. It simulates it enough that a part of you feels satiated that isn’t really. Except my personal favorite chess. Of course it takes a toll too.
A double edged sword that it, this blog, could become much more popular. Will look back fondly too the days when only geniuses, ex spooks and phds felt comfortable speaking out in this forum. May free speech once again become the backbone of humanity. Maybe, if more important, live debate.
Would that a lot of them are not irretrievably lost?
Very limited comfort level posting here especially since have not read the rules yet. Still all the best to the whole Saker crew.