One of the things that I noticed was that out of 59 bloggers that participated in my poll, all of them were women.  Not a single man contributed his thoughts, nor did a single teen.  I’m not sure why that is, but I find it interesting.

People are curious things to observe.  As I would read over each comment there were basically two kinds of people; those that answered my questions with short simple answers and those that expounded on their answers.  For instance the question, “Do you have more than one blog?” could either bring me a, “no,” or a, “no, I don’t have time,” “I used to have one over at ….”  Knowing myself, I would have only answered no, it made me wonder if people answer this way for the same reason I do.  I’m not about to give you any more information then you asked for.  Stick to the business at hand, and we’ll get along just fine. 

It was suggested my list of questions was more like a survey, not a poll.  I looked up the definitions of both because I sure didn’t want to look dumb in front of the entire blogosphere.  My studying led me to believe it could be either.  I decided to keep going with poll, because that was what I had called it and didn’t want to switch in the midst of things. 

Here is the definition of a survey: 

To query (someone) in order to collect data for the analysis of some aspect of a group or area.

Here is a definition of poll:

A questioning or canvassing of persons selected at random or by quota to obtain information or opinions to be analyzed b : a record of the information so obtained.

So, let’s move on to the last two questions from my poll. 

10.    Do you have more than one blog?  Where?

11.    Do you read random blogs either off of friends’ lists or random blogger?

We learned that roughly half of those who left a comment on my poll did have another blog, 27 to be exact.  12 of those had more than one blog right here at HSB.  11 have one over at homesteadblogger.  Which set me to wondering if homeschoolblogger is shortened to HSB, how do you shorten homesteadblogger?  You can’t call it HSB as well. 

Anyway, here’s what we learned from asking the question; People like to blog. So much so they have gone off and started another blog.  Some of the multi-bloggers were very proud of their blog collection and wanted to show it off.  I can’t say as I blame them, I’d like it if more people came to look at just this blog.  Here is a list of other blogs that were presented to me:

www.HomesteadBlogger.com/HomesteadersatHeart

http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/KarensKitchen/

www.Homesteadblogger.com/fireside/

http://spaces.msn.com/members/lunenburgpuddin/

http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/Harriette

http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/jacobsacademy

http://www.homesteadblogger.com/southofthegnatline

http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/jacobshollow

www.gentlebreezes.blogspot.com

www.vjsurprise.blogspot.com

http://www.homesteadblogger.com/caretakerscottage

www.Homesteadblogger.com/farmlife101

http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/HSNNC

www.Homesteadblogger.com/Amber

www.carriedonthewind.blogspot.com

People don’t just like to write in their blogs they love to go read other blogs.  55 said that they like to find new friends through various means.  4 did not. 

The #1 way to look for new and exciting blogs was through friends’ lists.  If your friend liked them why wouldn’t you?  The next in line was pushing the random blogger button.  This used to be my personal favorite until I realized that just about every time I wound up with the same people I had random blogged the day before.  Half of which hadn’t blogged in a coons age.  This was the #1 complaint by those who said they used the random blogger button.  I know that this problem was supposed to be fixed a few months ago, but so far, the bloggers aren’t seeing the results of it. 

So, I suppose one way to get yourself read by other bloggers is to make a lot of friends, so you will be on their friends list. The other is to write frequently enough so that your blog remains up to date and will be read when that random blogger button gets the click.

That’s it for my Homeschoolblogger Poll 2006.  I’m working on one for 2007, and if you have any questions you think might be fun to ask other homeschool bloggers drop me a comment.   

We may have different ideas about how to homeschool, how much we are willing to share with others, and even why we started to blog in the first place, but in the end we’re all just HomeschoolBloggers after all.