[kandesmurphy]

I've noticed a lot of blogs now have the tracking information about who has visited and it lists your city. It's a little scary to me because my blog profile doesn't even list my actual city and yet it comes up on other's blogs. Does anyone know if there is a way to block it? I've been very careful with no last names and no city or state on our blog so I don't want to lose that safety net I've created. Also, if you blog does track people, does it connect where visitors are from with either a comment or blog profile? In other words could you see that kandesmurphy from City, State stopped by today?

One other little question - I have a counter but I can't get it to go horizontal. It's just vertical. It's from a uk counter site. Any ideas on how to change it?

Thanks,
Kathy

[beachykeen]

I use sitemeter.com. I can see the IP address that the person looked at my blog from, and usually the carrier - RoadRunner, AOL, etc. It does not tell me who specifically, namewise. There's probably a way to block your IP address, but offhand I don't know what it is.

[AngelsMama]

I have the kind you're talking about. I have no idea WHO is looking just where the people are from and how they came to my site. There is no way for me to tell the actual person or profile that is connected to the city shown. I hope this helps put you at ease. If you are really scared about it.....in that little window there is a spot that says options at the bottom....you can click block my ip address. But ;like I said I don't know who you are just the city.

[Michelle Smiles]

I use mapstats and I get map that lists visitor's IP address which indicates the city or area they are from and it tracks if they use internet explorer or firefox or some other browser. It does not connect them to their comment or blog profile. I could probably put some effort into it and look at the times and cross reference it with comments left but honestly I don't pay attention. I only look at someone's IP address if they leave a nasty anonymous comment or if I think someone I know in real life has discovered me and I'm curious if someone in my hometown has been visiting. I'm sure there are ways to block your IP address but I believe it is a pretty geeky function to do so because having the IP address doesn't tell anyone anything more than what area of the country a visitor is from. For example, if I look (and I rarely do), I might see someone from Bucksnort TN visited but I don't know that is you or Jane Doe or anyone else. And I'm the only one with access to the details - even on those blogs that display the towns of the visitors, other visitors can't track IP addresses.

The safety net you've created is something of an illusion but only if someone really wants to keep track of you. You always leave an electronic trail on the net. I don't know any bloggers who put time and energy into figuring out where readers are from - but if someone wanted to, they could probably pinpoint a general area you are from.

[robandjulie]

we use sitemeter, too. I can tell that someone from ABC.edu university was on and assume it's my friend there or that the person at 5AM on the small carrier service in my hometown was probably my dad, etc. And if you go to "show by out clicks" you can see who the last person was that clicked on "0 comments" before it turned into "1 comment" or likewise and what service they used and infer who the comment was. So if anonymous comment #5 was questionable, you can see who the last person was that clicked on "4 comments" (meaning they clicked that, it opened to the comments, and after that it was listed as "5 comments" on the link so they must have left the comment).

As for blocking your own IP when you are out reading other people, I don't know how to do it, but there's probably a way.