Up until a couple of months ago, I never imagined that (1) I’d be spending this much time on college conference expansion analysis and (2) this blog would be receiving several hundred comments per post. Not only that, your comments have been so incredibly thoughtful, well-written and insightful that it keeps readers coming back. (Well, except for this guy.) The most touching notes are from people that have said that they’re happy to find a place where fans can discuss a pretty hot and emotional topic with a high level of discourse, civility and good humor. There really isn’t a better compliment than that in terms of what I’ve wanted from this little piece of the Interweb. My favorite part of writing this blog isn’t writing the posts themselves, but getting to see all of the great viewpoints from across the country.
Of course, with rapid growth comes growing pains in the form of finding out that the WordPress.com commenting platform is powered by a couple of dehydrated gerbils. A lot of the readers have been posting breaking news articles in almost real-time, so I don’t want them to get lost in the shuffle. So, here are a few things to address this:
(1) Frank the Tank’s Slant: The Forum – I’ve created a new message board for people to post news articles and their own thoughts located at http://frankthetank2000.proboards.com. If you’ve ever read my original objective for this blog, you know that I actually went out of my way to say that I was going to be a generalist as opposed to focusing on any niche. Normally at this time of year, I’d be dissecting Illini basketball in-depth and writing a 10,000 word diatribe questioning the existence of Vinny Del Negro in any coaching capacity. Well, this round of college conference expansion is fluid and interesting enough for me to focus on it for the time being (and I love to write about it), but I also encourage people to discuss topics that have nothing to do with Big Ten expansion, whether it’s related to sports or your favorite TV shows. Personally, I’m dying to get a dialogue going on this season of LOST. Regardless, the forum will hopefully be a useful tool to post new info, address different topics and get feedback in a more organized manner than the clusterfuck of the WordPress.com commenting system.
(2) New Email Address: frankthetank.illini@gmail.com – The comments have been coming in so fast and furious lately that it’s tough to keep up with a lot of the questions posed to me. If you want to contact me directly, please send a message to the aforementioned Gmail account. Who knows – we may have to institute a regular mailbag post if there are enough questions out there.
(3) Twitter – Just as a reminder, I also have my Twitter account @frankthetank111, so feel free to follow my angst on Selection Sunday as to whether Illinois will make it into the NCAA Tournament.
Enjoy the rest of your weekend and GO ILLINI!
FRANK THE TANK'S SLANT 
I’m just a little confused. Do you still want or accept comments here and a continuation of some of the discussions to continue on this wordpress blog or do you want everything migrating to the Forum? Since you posted this last mouse entry the activity has died here.
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I definitely want people to keep posting comments here on the blog. The main hope for the message board is for people who have been writing comments that are effectively quality blog entries themselves don’t get lost in the shuffle and they can highlight their thoughts. I certainly want to make sure that the blog is still the center of activity and I’ll always be posting my main thoughts here.
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Ok. Get it. Thanks Frank
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I’d be curious to see how many page hits you’ve gotten on the expansion posts.
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dcphx,
i would too!
frank..
a) nothing says fun like a singing rodent
b) tough day for the illini, i had them beating tOSU – so close, dangit!
c) will this get archived.. so one could download it a one big block?
d) have you figured out why the posts get placed randomly?
e) with illinois out do you root for gophers or buckeyes?
f) does illinois make the NCAA tomorrow??
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The WordPress comment placement continues to perplex me. I honestly don’t know who to root for. At this point, Minnesota ought to get in ahead of us if it comes down to us two for an at-large bid. I honestly don’t know if Minny getting the auto-bid helps or hurts us because it can be looked at both ways. On the one hand, every loss that Minnesota suffers is supposedly good for us. If OSU blows Minnesota out, that makes our 2OT game against the Buckeyes look a lot better by comparison. On the other hand, Minnesota winning also makes our loss against them a couple of weeks ago look a lot better on our profile. If I had to choose, I’d want to see OSU blow Minnesota out. Otherwise, it might be the case that tomorrow’s game won’t have an impact on the Illini. I felt pretty good after the 2OT game (even though we blew it), but Minnesota’s pounding of Purdue and Washington taking a spot by beating Cal for the Pac-10 title now makes me think we’re NIT-bound.
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@Dcphx – the Big Ten Expansion Index post has been read by around 80,000 people, which is by far the most popular piece on this blog. The subsequent posts have averaged around 10,000 readers. It’s really been an insane spike considering that this blog used to get around 200 or so visitors per day and now there can be easily that many people visiting in an hour or even half-hour. All of you commenters sincerely need to be credited for that – people keep wanting to come back to see what you have to say.
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frank,
there is hope in blog land!!
most people want 1 or 2 lines.. and an increase in hits to drive revenue.. aside from degrading to single sentence name calling (yes, ESPN and others) i like that it is not password based. if you read many blogs it becomes a nightmare to remember multiple names and passwords..
the people posting may add to the conversation.. but you set the tone.. i wanted this type of discussion on the political front, but people get too party based.. any suggestion on a political site with this type long thought out discussion without the name calling??
thanks
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