Earlier this year I had mentioned that I had been blogging on Watts Up With That for over 10 years straight. Because of that I felt the need to take a sabbatical this summer, and I asked readers for some help in doing that. Many, many, people generously responded with offers of help, offers of visits and lodging, and many other things. I’m eternally grateful to all those who have stepped up to help to keep this website running during my absence, as well as those who made my rest and relaxation possible. We added a crop of new moderators who have kept comments flowing, and I thank you for what is essentially a thankless job. I want to give particular thanks to our own Charles the Moderator a.k.a. CTM, who has kept WUWT populated with stories while I took some much needed rest. I also want to give thanks to the many guest authors who have contributed stories and to our regular authors Eric Worrall and David Middleton who have regularly published stories here. If I’ve missed anyone, it’s not intentional.
Those of you that have been watching closely have noted that I have published a few stories this summer (when the mood struck me) as well as recently a series of stories for hurricanes Harvey and Irma, I also outlined the excellent adventure Charles and I had watching the total solar eclipse. I have to tell you that was truly the experience of a lifetime.
As of yesterday (Monday 10/2) I’m officially back and I feel good. I’m recharged and I have some fresh ideas that you’ll see taking place here on a regular basis. I also have a book in the works and another new project which I will outline at a future date that holds promise for putting climate modeling and climate modelers feet to the fire.Details on that will be forthcoming in a future post.
Amazon Deal: 44% off on Universal OBD II Scanner Car Engine Fault Code Reader
In the short term I’d like to ask our readers to take a moment to look at the sidebar and the advertisement for the Q-Lav. This is an invention marketing of our own Charles the moderator, and I’m running this ad as a favor to him in thanks for all he has done. If readers have a need for such a device I urge you to take a moment and purchase it. He also has a very special chocolate that prevents gastrointestinal distress for people that are sensitive to certain types of sugars. It’s called Crotter’s Best.
Some of the things that you’ll see in the coming weeks:
- Some site reorganization – for example some of the reference pages are getting a bit stale due to broken links, I will be working on those
- A new front page format – the current format does not keep stories front and center very long and as a result useful conversations often get pushed out of sight. A good example is the recent story on a random walk analysis of temperature data which has scrolled off the main page after just two days.
- In-line ads from Amazon.com – (an example is above) these will be fairly unobtrusive and will link to deals of the day and lightning deals, and of course things like Climate related Books. Dr. Roy Spencer’s recent success in publishing two eBooks on Climate and Hurricanes owe their success in no small part to WUWT readers. This is a no-additional-cost way for readers to support WUWT, as it nets small percentage of each Amazon purchase.
- Regular features will return – such as “quote of the week” and “climate craziness of the week” plus some new features.
- Comment submission improvement – some comments end up flagged that should not be, some tuning is needed to keep the flow going while weeding out junk comments or comments that violate site policy
Of course, I’m open to suggestions any of you might have for making WUWT better and more effective. Leave a comment if you have an idea.
Again, my sincere thanks to everyone for all of your help, let’s make the next 10 years is even better!
Welcome back Anthony, Charles did a fine job – good choice.
And a hearty welcome back from me too, Anthony. Glad to hear your break had the desired result.
But see: I told you we’d all be here waiting for you on your return? And so it has come to pass…
Welcome back and thank you to everyone involved with this site. Not a day goes by without new learning when reading here.
Welcome back and many thanks for running one of the most important sites on the web.
Hey Anthony, welcome back!
And thanks to Charles and the other moderators for all their hard work.
Best, Allan
Glad to read that you feel recharged. A favorite site for me, I stop in once or twice every day.
Great news. Promote yourself to editor or publisher, and delegate more of the work.
Welcome back Anthony…and a big Thank You to the guys who held down the fort while you were gone! My morning always starts with a visit to WUWT. There was a previous comment about the need to be civil to Alarmists who comment here. I agree. We should ‘bite our tongues’ and not attack them personally. Someone needs to be the adult in this fight…..and it has always been us in the past.
That Alarmist comments appear at all puts the site far ahead of the curve. Skeptics rarely get the same courtesy on Alarmist sites.
And Alarmism is wrapped heavily in identity politics, so any rebuttal, no matter how politely expressed, will likely be claimed a personal attack.
And using passive-aggressive, pseudo-polite language to attract hostility, then complain about people being mean, is a common ploy of the more insidious trolls.
Welcome back!
A sign of effective leadership is that the founder can take time off and the wheels don’t fall off.
Congratulations.
And thanks.
welcome back, and good to see you at our secret meeting aboard the Nibiru mother ship!
We cheated death, again!
On the eclipse: yes, it was impressive. From home it wasn’t 100%. Only 99.8.
But sitting on the deck seemed a better idea than fighting the traffic and looking for a viewing area a few miles south.
For anyone interested, I have a video which combines two views, one of the sun, and the other a view looking south over the track of the shadow taken from my drone … we are at 550′, so with a couple of hundred extra, the view is pretty good, you can see the light on the other side of the shadow.
Anyway, if you are interested:
Great video, well worth watching! Adding it to “Useful things you can do with a drone”
Haaayyyyyy!!!
Welcome back,hope your new Tan will last the winter……
Welcome back, Anthony. We all deeply appreciate what you do.
But I agree with Willis. Continue to have your fine assistants to do the day-to-day stuff, and give yourself time to think about the strategic issues.
Good to see you back. Great job done by the fill ins while you were away as well. Did not miss a beat. Well done all