It is said, a picture(s) is worth a thousand words ....
Posted on 01/19/2011 10:00:05 AM PST by Jim Robinson
Edited on 01/19/2011 10:21:38 AM PST by Jim Robinson. [history]
I'm placing this in breaking news, because there have been several breaking news complaint threads recently. Guess there are a lot of people not understanding the facts about FR, or what we stand for, where we're going, etc.
First of all, who reads FR and how many accounts do we have? I honestly have no idea and the exact number does not concern me. We currently have over 369,000 registered accounts on FR, but as someone pointed out yesterday, not all of them are active and I have no idea how many are active.
Many years ago we had less than 30,000 accounts registered. Then we hit a hundred thousand, a hundred fifty thousand, then two hundred thousand and three or four years ago we approached and went over 300,000. Every few years as we hit a major milestone in registered accounts, I updated our home page with the current number of accounts on FR. I'll probably do it again after we go over 400,000, then 500,000, etc, and maybe I won't. The number of registered accounts doesn't really mean much. And our growth in the last few years has tapered off anyway for various reasons.
Who actually reads FR? Again, we have no idea, but there are hundreds of thousands maybe even millions of readers. All kinds of people read FR. News hounds, liberals, conservatives, politicians, talk show hosts, religious types, atheists, you and me brother and everyone in between. We serve over 1,000,000 pageviews per day.
So why has our growth tapered off? Well, probably the primary reason is we've narrowed our point of view lately as we've moved away from just talking about the issues and have actually started becoming constitutional activists.
The time for talking is over. Now we need to walk the walk. Our focus has become closer to working on our primary goal which is a return to constitutionally limited government and a full restoration of our God-given unalienable rights.
We can't do that by being big tent, all things to all people, non-principled, two-talking politicians. If we are truly interested in advancing our traditional conservative pro-God, pro-family, pro-life, pro-country, pro-liberty principles and positions then we must reject the politicians and people supporting the other way.
As an organization, we cannot be both for and against homosexuality, abortion, big government, border and national security, etc. I don't know about others, but if we must choose, I choose to be on the right side of each and every issue. Why should FR use its limited resources to allow liberals, homosexualists, abortionists, big spenders, big taxers, big government solutions advocates, gun grabbers, pacifists, isolationists, environmentalists, open-borders lobbyists, etc, ply their trade on FR? Well, more and more lately, we don't. And, apparently, that has pissed off a lot of big tent, true blue RINO types and the herd is stampeding. Let them go.
We who share our common traditional conservative principles, values and goals will be better off in the long run. We need to build on our strengths and attract more traditional conservatives to our viewpoints than to water down and weaken our own. It just doesn't make sense to me to support politicians like Giuliani, Romney, Gingrich, et al, who have RINO/liberal track records. It doesn't make sense to allow abortionists, homosexualists, gun-grabbers, big-government solutionists, etc, to have free rein on FR to target and lambast us daily with their repugnant bile. Let them go.
FR will continue on the traditional God, family, country, life and liberty path. If it means fewer accounts or less growth, so be it. If it means we receive fewer in donations, so be it. We will adapt, improvise and overcome and I believe prosper (God willing) in the long run. And, hopefully, someday we can say that we helped restore our beloved republic and our Liberty!
The problem with the “big tent” style of Republican politics is where they end up sticking the pole.
I, too, wish to “roger” on all this and take the opportunity to thank Mr. Robinson and staff for the Free Republic forum and all who participate on it.
Just a note of amazment that it’s all run from the People’s Republic of California...though your perspective from the Belly of the Beast makes your work all that more important...
but if you need to move, come on over - Virginia is for Lovers!!!!
Nam Era Vet here, too! Well said, Jim. We do agree with you 100%. Fact of the matter, FReepers are Patriots of our day. The pen is mightier than the sword and at present, our battleground realm is in the field of opinion regarding “Truth”. I come to this website daily seeking truth. Thank God, he gave us the ability to discern it. The “necessary idiots” of our time don’t necessarily want to hear it. As you aptly put it they are engaged to “ply their trade”. Down here in Texas, we like to draw lines in the sand. I think it is obvious we have done that already. I thank you, Jim, for your stand. Our “forefathers” are quoted at the signing of the Declaration of Independence as saying, “And for the support of this Declaration with a firm reliance on the protection of divine providence, we mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor.” Those words ring true today!
Dede Scozzafava.
I love that picture...their eyes are locked and loaded...
their souls gave each other a big hug...
There are many sites one can go to for RINO news and philosophy. I’m grateful that this site exists as it is, for hard-core conservatism!
Conservatism rules! Keep FR conservative.
BUMP to that!
Gingrich is way to quick to reach across the isle. He has good ideas, but won’t follow through with them if public opinion is blowing the other way.
Who can forget his ad with Nancy Pelosi about global warming (which we all now know, is cooling).
I try to like him (being a Georgian), but I can’t trust him enough to carry the conservative message.
When I joined FR, it was one of the few places that identified itself as unconditionally Conservative. And back then, other than listening to Rush, there weren't many places for Conservatives who were sick to death of being barraged by leftists spew from every direction and source.
A Conservative might be able to get onto Rush's program to voice support, but it wasn't likely. And Conservatives knew that if newspapers ever even printed one of their letters, it could easily be cropped short, or even changed, at the editor's whim.
Basically, the real number of Conservatives out there was functionally hidden by leftists holding the "gatekeepers" keys to information dissemination, who constantly described Conservatives as a minority.
Then, along came FR!
Here was a proudly self-declared Conservative site, where conservatives could post, discuss, dissect, ridicule, and point out the blatant lies being disseminated by the leftist media.
And, at the same time, they could see that there were many, many others who held the same Conservative views, and who loved their country and hated seeing it destroyed by the leftists/communists who had buried themselves in media, education and government so that they could implement their destructive plans.
What a breath of fresh air FR was. A sane place in a sea of leftist insanity.
Over the years, I watched many posters arrive, purportedly to be a part of FR and its clearly stated Conservative positions and goals. Many of them have departed, some voluntarily through the Opus door, and others involuntarily through the Zot trap-door.
Some found that their view of being a Conservative didn't match the view of the owner of FR. Some incorrectly thought that they had become so well known on FR that they somehow "owned" FR, and after being reminded that they didn't, went off to start their own site(s).
With the growth of the Internet, and the wide range of sites available to view, join and support, FR may have (to some) lost its uniqueness as the "place to be" online.
For me, it still is the place to be, and it is the home page of my browser. It is still the place that I come to almost every day to join fellow Conservatives in discussing, dissecting, ridiculing, and pointing out the ever more blatant lies being disseminated by the leftist media (and as has now become obvious -- by the RINOs).
Your position is, I believe, the correct one. It is the natural extension of your previous position clarifying that FR was not a wide-open debating society for liberals because that is not the purpose of FR, and that there are thousands of other places online, should someone be looking for that.
FR is a clearly defined, and well known, place where people come to find the answer to the question: "What do Conservatives think about things, what do they believe in, and what are they ready to fight for?" Quoting, and attacking, FR and its posters has become a full-time activity for many in the leftist media.
Jim, you have my continued support, and my monthly contribution, to help you in fighting the good fight. If we lose America, there is no place else to go. So let's stand and fight together. May God bless America and keep her safe!
Bless you sir!
It is said, a picture(s) is worth a thousand words ....
I know that on FR, if I post sloppy stats or erroneous data, I am going to be called on it. My beliefs and opinions are stronger in that I have to defend them to intelligent people who hold differing opinions.
I don't want us to lose that.
There are plenty of sites to debate the left. That's not FR's purpose.
My last dog did take a good pull of the so called coffee.
Strangely, she didn’t seem all that different afterwards.
Turkey.
Ugh.
Here they chase my car.
Kinda like, “Welcome to NY, now get out.” only with feathers and wharggling noises.
Some people aren’t informed enough to know better.
So they get swayed by the trolls imply because they don’t know what “conservative” is.
Even now there are people who have been on this site for years who still haven’t a clue what a conservative is.
They are the people who the referred infiltrators want.
Sway a few people, and you create a shrieking band of dissent from within.
And their beaks HURT!
Yes.
I discovered that the hard way while hiking.
Who reads FR?
Over 300,000 people have registered for posting privileges on Free Republic since inception in 1996 and our forum is read daily by over one hundred thousand freedom loving citizens and patriots from all around the country, and all around the world. We're currently delivering over thirty million pageviews per month to over one million visitors.
This section wasn't changed since the first week of Dec 2008, when the number of users went up from 200,000 to 300,000 and the number of pageviews and visitors was introduced for the first time.
I have no doubt that you thought at this time that the number of people who have registered for posting privileges was correct then, as the user ID #300,000 was already taken in May 2008, though less than 230,000 user names were registered in Dec 2008.
And I have no doubt that the statement We're currently delivering over thirty million pageviews per month to over one million visitors was correct at the time. But is it still correct today? Are you currently delivering that many pageviews and greet that many visitors? Have a look at the monthly edits here at FR: 
The numbers are impressive and reflect the contributions of a strong community. Nevertheless, the months prior to Dec 2008 were exceptional - Oct 2008 is the strongest month since 2005. That's not much of a surprise because of the presidential elections in this year.
As one may assume that the number of pageviews and of visitors is somewhat proportional to the number of edits, the currently current figures should have dropped considerably from the time two years ago.
So, why not give the current information - or drop the lines, as they are at best of historic interest, at worst misleading.
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