{"id":39407,"date":"2026-05-13T21:31:46","date_gmt":"2026-05-14T02:31:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/?p=39407"},"modified":"2026-05-13T21:31:46","modified_gmt":"2026-05-14T02:31:46","slug":"this-week-marks-15-years-for-a-website-that-has-evolved-wildly","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/?p=39407","title":{"rendered":"This week marks 15 years for a website that has evolved wildly"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

It was 15 years ago this week when I posted the first articles to this website. For the first few months, I struggled to figure out the site\u2019s direction \u2014 and some of the early articles were pretty terrible.<\/p>\n

(This review<\/a> of the first \u201cAtlas Shrugged\u201d film is still completely accurate, though.)<\/p>\n

I posted a couple of articles before I announced anything and then I announced the launch on May 13, 2011 with a post on Facebook. The screenshot above is from 11 years ago, so it reflects the basics of the older design I used from the beginning.<\/p>\n

There are times when I read things I\u2019ve published here and I\u2019m embarrassed about them, especially the earlier material. The things I\u2019ve been publishing for the last five years or so are a reflection of how my priorities have changed. (Here\u2019s a guide<\/a> to my current content.)<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve realized that the things I now see as important are not “social media-friendly,\u201d so I have a real problem connecting with the people I truly want to connect with today. For most people, the work I publish now is almost invisible.<\/p>\n

Back when I was writing about politics all the time, I had tens of thousands of daily readers. (My best day was a bit more than 30,000 readers.) Now that I write about very different things \u2014 which I see as far more important, but which many people see as boring \u2014 daily readership is sometimes as low as a couple hundred people.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m happy with my current direction and I have a lot more to say. I want to write more. I want to make films. I want to explore other media. I’m confident that the right people will find me and connect with me when the time is right.<\/p>\n

But no matter how small my audience might be in the meantime, I appreciate you being here. And I especially appreciate those who\u2019ve been here from the beginning.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It was 15 years ago this week when I posted the first articles to this website. For the first few months, I struggled to figure out the site\u2019s direction \u2014 and some of the early articles were pretty terrible. (This review of the first \u201cAtlas Shrugged\u201d film is still completely accurate, though.) I posted a Keep Reading<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-39407","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-uncategorized","7":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1x9iR-afB","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39407","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=39407"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39407\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":39419,"href":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39407\/revisions\/39419"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=39407"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=39407"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=39407"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}