> The first thing I enjoy about Rinkworks is the community. I've been to certain "community" sites but have never gotten very involved in them. And although I remain somewhat on the outside, I do feel that I am a part of the Rinkworks community. And it pleases me. When you have a small group of people who never seem to fight, or show true animosity or any other hurtful feelings, it really encourages a person to want to stay and be a part of it.
>

This post reminded me of an e-mail that I sent to Sam way back when, in which I fretted over my prediction that as the site grew in readership, its personal feel would necessarily diminish. Amazingly, I was able to dig up that e-mail, which is dated almost exactly two years ago, Nov. 21, 1998. Here's the "me fretting" part:

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> Another thought that visits me occasionally: what will you do when
>RinkWorks becomes more of a mega-site? It seems inevitable that, being
>one of those rare Internet sites with first-rate content (no, really!),
>RinkWorks will eventually attract much greater numbers of visitors, both
>regular and occasional. That will be rewarding, of course, but it would
>be a pity if it significantly changed the feel of the site. Right now,
>one of the best things about RinkWorks (from my perspective) is that it's
>so carefully hand-crafted, and your personal "touch" in each feature
>gives the site its personality. It would be a shame, I think, if many
>people simply came and laughed at the gags as though they were cranked
>out by machine, and left without absorbing that personality. I don't
>know; that probably happens already, I suppose. Me, I like being a
>participant in the world of RW. :-)

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... and here's Sam's response to my sycophantic boot-licking. :-) I hope he won't mind my reproducing it here.

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And I like it that you do. Indeed, I certainly find readers that like to
stick around, participate, and "absorb personality" to be the most rewarding
kind. But yeah, there are readers that come, get what they want, and never
return -- there always has been and always will be. Sometimes people aren't
as interested in others. Sometimes people come by way of a subpage (for
example a lot of people hit the specific review pages on At-A-Glance via
the links in the Internet Movie Database, then leave) and either don't
realize there is more or aren't interested in more.

Regardless, I don't see how increased traffic levels would or could change
the feel of the site. I develop stuff for it. As long as I have *some*
readers, I don't see why I'd stop. True, reader feedback and to a lesser
extent relative traffic levels influences the way I maintain the site,
but less than you might think. Crazy Libs gets decent traffic, especially
on weekends for some bizarre reason. But my heart isn't in it. It was when
I first created the site, but now that it's out, I'm pretty ambivalent towards
it. (Maybe it's a lack of personality to absorb. :-) ) The traffic and the
update requests keep me updating it, but not as much as the traffic and
requests probably warrant. This is a long and rambling example of how
traffic influences me but isn't my primary drive.

By the way, the traffic levels *are* increasing. I'd say it's doubled from
two or three months ago. I'm ecstatic about it, because my advertising
banners are finally starting to make a significant amount of money. Still
not enough to justify my time, but if I were doing it for the money, well,
I wouldn't be doing it.

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So there it is, from the giver of Rinkiness himself, who isn't even doing it for the moolah. Thanks, Sam -- your rulingness continues unabated!

Iss "fretted needlessly over the introduction of RinkChat" achar