It's a pretty simple equation to grasp, as Paul indicates. Posting brings traffic. Too bad it's not tracking RSS too! I'm not sure how many feed readers I have, but I know from my own behavior that I almost never visit a weblog again once I've signed up for the feed, IF THEY HAVE FULL TEXT FEEDS. If they don't, I'll visit, but grudgingly!

What's interesting in these stats is the uptick on the 20th, largely due to my post telling people that they needed to produce full text RSS, which brought in links from others (though the trackbacks lie, the stats tell the truth!). The site always takes a dump on Fridays and the weekends, unless I post something outlandish.

Dana, this is because RSS acts like traditional print does in terms of circ. figures. The better the editorial, the more the issue is read, but this will not reflect in the numbers. I've noticed the same thing.

Typically, on a web page, an extra pageview is created when someone clicks into a headline. Or, in the case of many blogs, where there aren't those extra clicks, people see links to an important (or silly) post and create additional traffic.

But people generally aren't going to start subscribing to the RSS just because of a post, so these figures won't increase much.

Interestingly, this means that RSS circ. figures are probably about as misleading as print. The assumption that an ad in a magazine gets seen by x (circ. = x) many people is WAY off. I see this in the comments of advertisers on my site, which competes against print trade magazines. The better direct performance of ads on my sites is less a product of anything good I'm doing and more a matter that there are many fewer people paying attention to the ads than may be suggested by those competing circulation numbers. -tig