I don’t obsess (too much) over my web analytics, but I was surprised to see, oh, about nine times the usual volume of traffic to my site on Tuesday thanks to a prominent link to the Geek Test on reddit.com in the geek category.
Huh, I thought to myself while browsing through the couple hundred comments. Just imagine how much nicer this would all be if the test weren’t outdated.
There are little bumps in traffic here and there as fresh-faced geeks discover the Geek Test, but traffic has been pretty steady for a few years. Blogging regularly seems to have helped a little. Visitors at this point I think are mostly checking back now and then for an updated version of the test that I keep promising. I mean really, what’s my problem? I’ve developed a pretty nifty cycle of guilt, energized motivation, and paralyzed action about the whole update thing. It stresses me out and at this point it’s quite embarrassing. When I tell people about the Geek Test, I do so sheepishly with qualifiers and apologies in advance for its spiderwebs and creaky joints.
Well, that’s going to end on Sunday.
I’m not promising a huge revision of the test or a revamp of the site. I’m going to publish a minor update that will mostly just prune the out-of-date references and fix some glaring omissions. But you know what? It’s going to lift a weight off my shoulders and reduce my anxiety about The Big Update.
There’s still time to weigh in on what Geek Movies you would add or remove from the list. I may open another section up to discussion before Sunday, but for the most part I’m going to tackle this minor update it with the resources I already have. And when I say minor update, it really doesn’t sound scary at all!
An updated geek test. You want it, I want it, we all would sleep better at night if it were updated.
In my head, the task of updating it is a monstrous beast that requires ultimate preparation before going in for the attack. But… I never seem to be prepared enough. And that’s a problem. Especially when I get emails and guilt-inducing blog comments from really nice people who just want a more accurate geek score.
I have hundreds of emails from people that I started to organize in a sort of database to help me choose the best questions for the test. I haven’t kept it up very well, though, and frankly there are so many great suggestions that it’s really hard to imagine the test being limited to 500 points. But I honestly feel that it should not be longer than its current incarnation. (Weighting the questions is definitely something I want to do, but Step One needs to be addressed first.)
Here’s where you come in! I’m going to break the geek test down into chunks and request suggestions for one chunk only right here on my blog (since I’m already planning to be here every day in 2010). Let’s start with…
Core Geek Movies (that must be watched at least twice to count).To participate, leave a comment on this entry with this information:
- Which movies (listed below) you don’t think are geek core, with a brief explanation.
- Which movies you think deserve to be listed, with a brief explanation.
The Current Geek Movie List:
Bladerunner
Clerks
The Dark Crystal
The Fly
Highlander: the movie
The Last Starfighter
Lord of the Rings Trilogy
The Matrix
Any Monty Python movie
The Neverending Story
Princess Bride
Rocky Horror Picture Show
Spaceballs
TRON
War Games
Any Star Trek movie
All Star Trek movies
The Original Star Wars Trilogy
The New Star Wars Trilogy
Transformers: the movie
Weird Science
Any Kung Fu movie made before 1980
Thank you!
