100,000!

Sometime very late today or early tomorrow morning the counter on the number of visitors will reach the magic 100,000 mark. That means since 11th March 2006 (245 days ago), that all of you faithful and loyal readers out there have clicked on www.bruneiresources.blogspot.com for 100,000 times. This is excluding 14,000+ visitors on my predecessor blog on spaces.msn.

I would just like to take this opportunity to thank you for making time in your day to visit this site. Some I know visit the website early in the day, some during office hours (it's alright I won't tell), some during lunch time, some late in the afternoon and a few at night. I checked the IP addreses every once in a while and sometime I am quite surprised to see where you are coming from. The vast majority are Bruneians in Brunei, Malaysia, Singapore, UK, Australia and New Zealand with some other Bruneians in places such as Ireland, Japan, Switzerland, USA. Other visitors come as far away as from Iceland to Taiwan. There are others who drop in regularly too including someone from the USA State Department. I sure hope you are not formulating US government policy on Brunei based on this blog's entries. Brunei Times and Borneo Bulletin IP addresses also turn up on a daily basis and a couple of other newspapers as well.

My biggest thank you is to someone who you all know as RanoAdidas. His plug in April pushed the readership hovering below 100 to around 300 to 400 a day. Ranz, I owe you lots. The other event which triggers the rise to the average of 700 today is the entry on the new salary increments on 17th July 2006. That brought in lots of new readers and things have not stopped since. Readerships webbed and ebbed throughout every week. The weekdays see the most and the weekends see the least number of readers. Sundays usually the worst. I guess those free office internet connections which are only available during weekdays are partly the reason.

I started blogging for no reason other than to write and to express my thoughts. Doesn't everybody? I have always love writing even when I was at school but really have no avenue to explore. I wrote a few pieces for the Pelita Brunei short article under my better half's names and won a few $40 prizes. I stopped doing that as I thought it was a bit unfair of me when that $40 are meant to encourage younger writers. I then wrote a few articles on a get to know your children's toys series based on my son's toys but never bothered to get them published. If you ever see articles circulating talking about Ultraman, Power Rangers, Barbie, Sailormoons etc - most likely they are mine. Eventually, I found some blogs I like, lsm's, maurina's were two of them and I thought why not? The first few blogs started which at first are basically extension of my main website www.bruneiresources.com and functioned as a sort of what's new feature for that website.

As I write, I realised that these entries can serve a higher purpose. Just like when I first started bruneiresources.com where I shared a lot of materials which I have obtained throughout my career especially conference papers etc - this blogsite is where I can share daily snippets of my knowledge on Brunei - tell you all the whats, the wheres, the whens, the whys and the hows of Brunei. I look at it as a public service - as a way for me to pay back my debts to Brunei. I seek no other benefit. All I have always ask for is - accept the writings and used them to gain knowledge - but do not look at who the writer is. It is true that my work experiences shaped my writing but I would have to beg to all to accept the writer as who he wanted to be and not as a very senior government official.

I welcome all comments and one of the main feature of this site is to allow annonymous and unmoderated comments. I have been lucky that there has been only one or two comments which I really have to delete. Some comments have been critical ones and some have been overly nice. It does serve a nice balance. Every so often I would get requests from readers wanting me to write about something. Some requests ask if I could write a lot more about something else. I try to comply where possible but I am at the end of the day a civil servant and I am bound by the OSA as well as other laws. I read in someone's blog that I am too much of a royalist. Well I do try to present the government's point of view if that is what is meant by that. But when I am critical of another government's agency's policy - I try to be constructive. Criticising without giving advice is the worst of all criticisms (here I do have to apologise to the espeed people - that entry I remember was a crictical rant without advice).

At the end of the day, even if only one of you readers managed to get some form of education about Brunei - where you come from - why you are here in Brunei and how you can help contribute towards the development of Brunei - at least you are better informed about Brunei by that much more everyday, I am happy. Like Maurina said, it makes all the hatemails tolerable. So today as we basked in 100,000 readers achievements - it is you out there that deserved all the credits. Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you and thank you.

Comments

Anonymous said…
Mr. BR, Congratulations! To the next 100,000!
Anonymous said…
Congratulations Mr. BR! Here is to another 100,000 :)

Keep those entries coming in, and do not even think of stopping.

Your entries are my daily dose, a nice read to start the day (I am one of those who reads around 6am everyday..hehehe)
Anonymous said…
No..Thank You Mr. BR sir. Your daily blogs provides us with intellectual and stimulating reads to start the morning everyday. For that I say *well done* and keep up the excellent job. :)

There are great opportunities to educate and inform people and you sir, have achieved that! Wishing you all the best and for more to come.

A humbled reader.
God Bless.
Anonymous said…
Well well, congratulations on your milestone! Heh heh, November appears to be the month of milestones, doesn't it? (*shameless plug* My bithday and my 1,000 post)

I can't understand why for all the other Brunei blogs, the bulk of their readers come from Brunei. Mine come for the US! Brunei falls in at #4. If Bush & Co. are forming some foreign policy on Brunei they're spending a lot of time where they shouldn't be! ;)

Keep up the interesting work and don't take the excessively critical emails/comments to heart. If they have any value to them other than mindless rambling it will be obvious enough.
Anonymous said…
congratulations MR BR...
Anonymous said…
Hi BR. I guess we both have to thank Zaki for introducing us. Otherwise this wouldn't have been possible. I believe this education (of many forms) is still vital in our daily lives. And your website has been educational for readers not only in Brunei. I wonder what's the deal with the Asia Blog Awards? Have they yet to award the nominees? Well done on the milestone. Cheers..
Anonymous said…
Just keep going and aim for another milestone. We're firmly behind you to support your very well appreciated initiatives/efforts.
Anonymous said…
I see my BlogSpeak people have written before me. Anyway, BR, great job! Here is to "blogging for a higher purpose".

To LSM: Yes, MANY milestones. Some are not blogged about yet. ;)

Cheers!
Anonymous said…
Dear Mr. BR,
Many congrats and many thanks for those many Brunei daily insights.

I am one of the readers who check for your latest entry everyday. As soon as I log in to the PC at work, your blogspot is one of the first things that I check. I can't usually resist to post a comment once in a while, and I remember one of my posts was missing, so I guess it got deleted!! And more often than not, your daily entries become a discussion starter during our lunch hours.

I was introduced to your blogspot by a colleague and I've become an avid reader since then. So I guess I owe him my gratitude for letting me know this blog.

Many thanks again and keep it up.
Anonymous said…
Congrats, to Mr BR.

And thanks to You too!!! (since you keep on thanking us, the readers!!) for really given us the 'Sometimes-Serious-and Sometimes-Humourous-but-hopefully-Always-Informative' insights.

I happened to be your readers ever since i came across ur blog(when i did my research on the project on BSC) sometimes in June, during my internship at the MoF. And guess what!! my supervisor accidently happened to give us ur identity to us...Ooppss!!

Since then, i would log onto ur blog at home (for better viewing), or if not possible using my hp as the alternative...

Many thanks to u, Mr BR.
Anonymous said…
First: Congratulations for taking time and effort to put this site excellent blog together. Very informative and certainly keeps me thinking! Second: To those wondering why you get most of your hits from the U.S. is a technical one. Everytime you go to a site, e.g. google, that is based in the U.S., and then right after that you go to a Brunei registered site, e.g. BR, it automatically says it's from the U.S. I know, it's technical! Hope this sorts out some of the questions on some bloggers out there.
baz said…
hehe, i know i was one of the bruneians in singapore during the first weeks of ramadhan last month and since ur blog is so good, ive even recommended it to my workmates :)
Anonymous said…
congratulations..
Anonymous said…
You welcome, you welcome, you welcome. Now I can feel the pain in my fingers after clicking 100000 to visit your website. Phew! ^.^
BTW Congrats!
Anonymous said…
congrats, mr br. thanks for making me understand my country better ;)
Anonymous said…
Congrats MR. BR and keep on writing and I am one of your faithful daily readers too! Just like the others, got addicted to your daily blog and something life is not complete without reading your blog first thing in the morning. I can tell you that you are a very good writer and with you vast knowledge, I am sure one day (after you retire) you can publish a book! May God bless you always...
Anonymous said…
im one of the addicts,too!! Congrats BR!!Thank YOU!!i find myself more knowledgable cuz of ur writings..especially on Brunei (economically, socially, humourously, culturally, almost everything-ly!!). U make things easy for us!!Thank YOU!!
Anonymous said…
congratulations
Anonymous said…
Congratulations!
Anonymous said…
Congratulationz Boss! =)
Anonymous said…
Found his informative and interesting site this weekend... Will recommend to my friends..

Mr BR... well done and keep this up...

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