Maybe I’ll save those old Indesign posts after all...

I don’t have any metrics on bobwertz.com. I have no idea how many people read my posts on this site. I genuinely don’t care. But sketchbookb.com was setup when I was younger and cared about building an audience. I have Google Analytics installed and I can know exactly how many people are visiting there, if I want to look. I just don’t look.¹

Yesterday, I noted that I was going to abandon most of the old Indesign posts that currently live on Sketchbook B. I was working through setting up redirects as I move things around and figured I’d see how much traffic was still heading to that site, which has been essentially inactive since 2022. Turns out, those Indesign posts still get a lot of traffic.

Which leaves me conflicted.

• On one hand, these posts are dated. How helpful is an article about GREP Find and Replace in Creative Suite 4 posted in 2009?² Plus, I don’t care about “traffic.”
• On the other hand, I really hate link rot. I spot checked a couple of the tips and they are still mostly good. More importantly, the tips are niche enough, that they aren’t covered elsewhere. Creating vignettes in Indesign. Changing the size of the pasteboard. Customizing the links palette. They were relevant over a decade ago, and judging from traffic, they remain somewhat relevant today. And did I mention I really hate link rot?

Also, there was a point in time when I thought I could build an audience by sharing weekly Adobe tips. I put a lot of time and energy building those posts. That’s part of my writing history, even if I don’t want to be a Adobe blogger any more…

So damn it, I’m going to keep them and add a disclaimer that these tips are very old. That means I need to move over another 20-30 posts that I’d planned to abandon, but I’ll feel better knowing they still exist.

And seriously, GREP Find and Replace is amazing.

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Bob Wertz is a type designer, Ph.D. student and researcher living in Columbia, South Carolina. He’s been blogging since 2008 and has covered lots of topics over the years.