Three years ago, I set up The F1 Broadcasting Blog, and since then it has attracted visitors from all around the world..
– Total of 780,000 hits
– Over 6,200 followers on Twitter
– Average of 800 views per day
– Visitors from nearly 200 countries
– Connections with members of the F1 paddock and beyond
As regular readers will be aware, I have been juggling maintaining this blog with University work, which is quickly coming to an end! It’s funny, because I set this blog up at the end of my first year of University, and now, the end is near… expect the blog activity from me to pick back up in the next few weeks, although it will no doubt take time to get back into the swing of things. With another year passed, its also a good opportunity to see what the most read posts are in the blog’s history. There’s only one new post compared to this time last year, and even that post was written in 2013, I think that is because there has been no huge F1 broadcasting stories in the past year which have dominated the landscape. I’ve left the descriptions the same, so here is the top ten as it currently stands:
10. A few thoughts on Jake Humphrey leaving the BBC – September 18th, 2012
In September 2012, it was announced that Jake Humphrey would be leaving the BBC. In typical style, I published my reaction to his departure and speculated about who would replace him as F1 presenter. In all cases here, I was wide of the mark with my guesses.
9. Tom Clarkson added to BBC’s F1 TV team – March 6th, 2013
Tom Clarkson, who is he. Well, that’s what a lot of blog readers are still wondering, as this article has jumped back inside the top ten, despite Clarkson now in his third year as part of BBC’s Formula 1 team.
8. Doing the sums: the cost of viewing Sky Sports F1 this year – January 31st, 2013
Unsurprisingly, a popular article in 2013 involved people looking for the cheapest way to view Sky Sports F1 legally. The popularity of that article spawned a 2014 version, and more recently a 2015 version. Worryingly, the 2015 version is about to become outdated, with Sky’s prices going up again.
7. Are Sky going to withdraw F1 channel from old ‘HD Pack’ subscribers this month? – September 1st, 2013
Trying to update readers on the status of Sky’s legacy ‘HD Pack’ wasn’t easy. This is not the only entry on the subject inside the top ten…
6. Italian Grand Prix records highest rating since 1998 – September 10th, 2012
I can thank Jake Humphrey for this one. Another ratings related article, except in this case Humphrey decided to share it via Twitter. To date, September 10th, 2012 remains the most viewed day in the blog’s history, which shows how much power Twitter has (this statistic remains true in 2015).
5. Predicting BT Sport’s MotoGP team – October 24th, 2013
I should have learnt my lesson with number ten to not bother predicting things, sadly I didn’t learn and decided to predict BT’s MotoGP team. Nevertheless, I don’t think anyone predicted who the presenter would turn out to be! Thankfully, that particular person didn’t remain with the team too long…
4. ITV4 win rights to screen MotoGP highlights – March 8th, 2014
The big news from early last year was that ITV4 were going to screen MotoGP highlights on Monday evenings, following BT Sport winning the rights to screen the series exclusively from 2014 onwards.
3. Georgie Thompson leaves Sky’s F1 team – February 15th, 2013
In a surprising move, Georgie Thompson left the Sky Sports F1 team after only a year in the role, with Natalie Pinkham taking over her duties. The news was broken exclusively on this blog, with mainstream newspapers picking the story up a week later.
2. Are current Sky ‘HD Pack only’ customers with Sky Sports F1 set for a shock? – June 1st, 2013
Any money related articles are popular. This, the first ‘HD Pack’ rumour falls into that category. Once again, I don’t envisage any future articles on this particular train of thought, the consensus for Sky subscribers is “switch from the legacy HD Pack, and you will lose Sky Sports F1”.
1. Gary Anderson to leave BBC’s Formula 1 team – January 13th, 2014
Another person leaving, one year after Thompson. This time it was Gary Anderson, as he parted company with the BBC team. This remains the most read article in the blog’s history.
So, the question is “what happens next?” As always, who knows, although as I mentioned earlier, I fully expect blog activity to pick up in the next few weeks. I know it has been slow on the blog front in the past few months, but thanks for all the interactions, for getting involved and for engaging with the blog on a weekly basis. It really is appreciated. Here’s to another year of blogging!
Thanks,
Dave,
Owner of The F1 Broadcasting Blog
Motorsport Broadcasting 