categories | Piss and Moan

Shadow banned?

Posted on February 9, 2022 by backuphill

Anyone else kinda feel like when they talk about certain topics that they are getting shadow banned? I am starting to get a bit suspicious of WordPress.

For those who don’t know what a “shadow ban” is, you can read more about it in lots of different places. You hear about this taking place on lots of different social media platforms & accounts these days – mostly in regards to topics related to events, facts, data, and personalities of significance over the last 2+ years.

I don’t know if there is a way to really tell on the WP service, but I have noticed that certain topics definitely get fewer clicks/views than other topics. Maybe it’s because people are bored with the topics. Maybe people aren’t stimulated by certain subjects any longer. Maybe people are just to overly apathetic so the disinterest wins out. I don’t know.

Could it be the Categories I am using, or the tags? Is it the actual subject matter? I haven’t a clue. I guess I could try reposting a blog with different tags and categories and see if there is any different response.

Anyone else feel like they don’t get as much interest when it comes to certain “controversial” issues?

Categories and Tags

Posted on August 28, 2020 by backuphill

Blogging and all this stuff. I realize this is gonna be a first world problem, but it seems like a pretty easy fix and it’s hard to believe WordPress hasn’t already done it.

There is a process you go through to help drive traffic to your by using Categories and Tags. Then people who look for those specific topics are alerted, to some degree, that there is a blog post related to it. In the “old” version of getting ready to publish your blog out to the interwebs and make it public, you could select these things and it would tell you how many of each you were using on your blog.

As far as I can tell, this “new block editor” version of WordPress doesn’t do that. I have no quick way of telling how many Categories or Tags I’ve used unless I constantly scroll back and forth to count them.

This seems like a basic and easy fix to implement. Like seriously.

The picture above shows the Categories and Tags tabs. As of right now, I have Categories attached to this very blog I am writing, but you won’t know it until it is expanded.

So, why hasn’t it been set up that when the Categories or Tags is collapsed that it shows how many are under each tab without having to expand it? It could show up, right on the tab next to the tab title (like the image below – highlight added for emphasis).

So, when both the Categories and Tags tabs are collapsed, there is an easy way to see how many of each are being used.

Simple!

Too much to ask? Am I knit-picking? Am I easily irritated? (wait, don’t answer that…)

Or is this a function that they just didn’t think about? I find that hard to believe. I can’t believe they haven’t had feedback on this yet.

What do you all think? Did WordPress miss the boat on this feature?