R.I.P., SiteMeter

I've always been an advocate of redundancy, with essential components and features.

One essential feature of a website is the ability to remain aware of where your readers come from, and what they are reading, on your blog. Besides Blogger Stats, I've advocated both SiteMeter and StatCounter, in a complementary role to each other.

A while ago, SiteMeter decided to add video advertisements to their blog / website agent, that tracks the clicks.

Spending a few moments Googling the issue, I learned

• Many people have complained, to SiteMeter Support.
• The complaints are being ignored.

I took the only responsible action, and removed the SiteMeter agent from my blog.

You may wish to do the same, on your blog or website, if your readers do not have ultra fast computers and fat Internet connections. I guess the old saying

There ain't no such thing as a free lunch

has now, once again, been proven true.

Unwanted videos (invisible, in many cases) are even worse than unwanted music. Both produce noise, when you expect it least - and videos inhale bandwidth.

And recently, SiteMeter has been implicated in other, even more annoying oddities.

My apologies to those of you who have tried to read this blog, and found themselves with bandwidth and memory resource issues.