Well it is 2012 in Russia and I am assuming if all went well it is 2012 where you are also. So I was doing some delicious chicory sipping and thinking’s this morning, while the snow falls deep. I was doing some thinking’s about what I plan on doing with Windows to Russia during the 2012 year…
You will have to pardon me over the next year while I always slip and call my chicory drink – coffee. I have truly stopped drinking coffee and that was something that I never thought I would be able to do. I now enjoy my chicory so much that I do not even want coffee. Coffee has the wrong taste to it now and when I drink a cup while traveling in Ukraine, it just taste wrong anymore. Kinda like when I switched from regular coke to diet coke years ago. Regular coke just has the wrong flavor now…
But coffee is not what I started to write about! So lets get on track here…
Windows to Russia has started to finally come into its own during 2011 and in 2012 I will continue to fine tune the website to enable it to withstand bigger and higher traffic peaks and spikes. 2011 was a year of flabbergasting numbers for me as far as statistics go. I still remember 5 years ago and was excited when we peaked at Christmas the first year with 200 actual page views. I remember it was that same Christmas that Google decided to let the world find Windows to Russia on a search engine. For a year or so search engine was the life blood of Windows to Russia. Then readership started to grow and I watched the search engine rankings grow but as a percent of total views decrease, due to readers regularly stopping by…
I have a long history with Windows to Russia now and one day I expect to have it syndicated. Or I should say I hope to live that long and see it happen. We already have several sources of original material and I am always looking for anyone who has a desire to have articles posted that go along with my feelings on things. We now have a Pakistan writer that I have seen that many of you have read his works already and he brings another whole side to the Eastern world that I can only attempt to equate to. I am looking for someone from China, India, South America, Iran and any other country that would like to express a political opinion about the state of the world and what is happening. My ultimate goal is to have a Windows to the World situation…
As far as the website of Windows to Russia is concerned the internal structure is stable and as I have said before it is based on a very light weight CSS structure. This has been a major issue solver to withstand website attacks and the last few times I was attacked. No one knew it happened. That is why I continue to work on the site all the time. Now I still struggle with the cosmetics of the site and I hope that one day I find the correct combination of colors and styles to satisfy me forever. That may be a hard thing to achomplish because I am always looking to make something look better. Yes I know many times I make it look worse… 
, But as I said the internals are stable and the whole site consists of only three php files in the template. If you know anything about WordPress then you will understand how compact and simplified I have made my template. It actually is much more a webpage than a blog anymore. I also have installed two compressions plugins and the site is delivered compressed over 70% to your door step (If your doorstep accepts it that way!) and that makes life a whole lot better on bad width. Just in the last two months I have cut bandwidth by 65% and seen a 20% increase in page views. I still have a whole lot to learn about making the site better and faster but that is part of the fun…
I have several plans for 2012 and will give you a hint about some of them! The hint is pod-casting and lets throw a touch of video-casting in to the fray. Not sure if I can do it but we will see what happens in this new year…
I also have a desire that may or may not happen and that is to get Windows to Russia in a Russian language form. Machine translation does not work for things like that and I seriously could not see myself with good enough translation skills to go from English to Russian. Maybe from Russian to English but not the other way…
I am going to end this long post and quit boring you to death today. If you are like all my friends whether in Russia, America, China or anywhere else in the world then you are hung over from too many drinks of champagne from News years eve and day…
I am so glad I do not drink alcohol. Sveta and I toasted the New Year with a mug of chicory. I remember Sveta giggled and said, “I have never brought the New Year in with chicory before!”
Maybe that is a good sign for 2012…
Kyle Keeton
Windows to Russia!