Blogger's Note: Poll Results

I appreciate the engagement of the 20 people who responded to the poll.  The question was, Should We Keep the Google AI Links in the Posts?  The final tally is....

Yes:  12

No:  6

Of the 12 who answered Yes, 2 said they don't personally use it but think we should keep it. Of the 6 who answered No, 3 said they don't use it or like it but it's OK to stay if other's want to keep it. 

The final verdict is we will keep it for now.  I will see if I can tinker with it to make is more user-friendly and relevant.  I have long wanted for readers to be able to link to a Bio/Stats page by clicking on the name of a player but was never able to figure out how to do it on Blogger.  When Blogger offered this free option I saw it was an easy solution to that wish.  I admit I was a surprised at some of the links, especially ones that tell me some clever phrase I made up or borrowed is not really a thing.  I am also surprised that many players who do have bios and stat pages on sites like Baseball Reference, MLB or Fangraphs don't link.  What's that about?  I am not sure what readers see when they click on the links but in addition to a Google AI summary, I also see links to player's bio pages on multiple websites and readers can choose which site they prefer to use.  To me that's enough of a plus that it's worth keeping and trying to improve it.  

I do want to assure readers who are dismayed at what AI has done to social media this is not that.  I am NOT using AI to write my posts.  Every word I write is mine and mine alone.  If I borrow a clever phrase like "shopping the Brebbia Aisle" I always try to give credit where it's due and tell you where I got if from.  But yes, I hate AI generated content as much as all of you and you can generally spot it from the first sentence or two.  The sentences are too cleverly written with lots of "flowery" language but extremely superficial content with little to no useful or new information.  I can assure you won't see that on this blog. I will shut it down before I resort to that lazy content production.  

Again, thanks to everybody who reads and comments.  You all are a big part of what makes this blog great.