mitchmen's Most Viewed Post During 2023 (MPP2)

 

 

 

1

This year both the original Milking Factory post and IFNB review retained their positions at 1 & 2 with a marginal closing of the gap between them (relatively speaking).  The hit counts of both articles declined in a year in which visits to the blog generally fell by 27%. 

Other Milking Factory posts continued to feature further down the table at 9, 10 and 18. No 4 overtook No 3 in popularity this year (just!). That reversal was probably due to it's connection with a new addition to the series in late 2023 (No 15) featuring the same artist (Sarander)

The two IFNB articles at 2 and 19 kept their same positions as last year.

  

2

Brick's welcome return last year after many years absence was celebrated further with a rise to 3rd place for the oldest article in the table, I guess he's finding new fans now! That's thanks to Metalbond who published his new offerings and helpfully guided his readers to my 2008 article on his work. Another Brick article relating to his new work appears at 14. You can see from it's scores that it would have occupied the same position last year, but I disqualified new posts because they 'over-score' in their early months.  

Brick headed up a pack of old-timers but they were all a long way behind the top two. Cavelo always has a steady stream of visitors and they helped him climb back up to 6th place. Further down, Mike Carcel rose from 14 to 11 in what seems to be the 'old order' re-establishing itself after the disruptive excitement of the last few years. Their presence in this table seems permanent despite the articles being over 10 years old, their having ceased to publish new work and having no 'home' on the web (as far as I know, if you know better please tell me!). These are great artists but it's still an astonishing testament to their popularity. 

Priapus of Milet, a more modern favourite at this blog, also staged a comeback, jumping from 8 to 4.  His steady flow of super new art seems to assure continued interest in his origins documented in the A-Z article here. 

One of the more recent arrivals 'Amalaric - 1, A Slave to Passion' dropped to No 4 after it experienced one of the biggest falls of visits in the top 20. No 3 in the same series about his art did better, rising to 8th place in a falling market. There were some good performances from other articles in the series, but none look like joining the top table at the moment.

4

The first genuinely new entry into the table this year is 'The Bondage Art of Black Prof ' at 15 joining Muscle Matt in the cartoon department but with a very different style and subject matter. It just missed the top 20 last year and I have no doubt that this improvement was prompted by my 2022 discovery of his 'Tarzan Captured' story, which only just missed getting into this ranking - by a mere 9 hits. It's a ringing endorsement of this artist's work by my blog visitors.

'Tarzan Captured' might have won 'new post of the year' in 2023, if only it had been published a few weeks later (see most popular new post article  MPP1). The actual winner of new post of 2023, 'Slave Training 11 - Cockaphobia' finished at No 25

Tentakun's appearance at No 16 is a genuine surprise to me, but this article has scored steadily since it was published and kept up it's hit-rate better than most articles this year (87%). I like the sensuality and uncompromising eroticism of his work, thoroughly exploring favourite fetish themes with light touch.

Planet Gay got the blockbuster treatment from me with 4 articles in 2022 because I liked his more realistic, cinematic style and varied subjects. That artist is rewarded with 20th position and could be one to watch.

5

The main casualties resulting from these new entrants were Brosfate-3 (already mentioned in note 2) plus two oldies whose return last year proved to be a fleeting phenomenon - Mitchell's A-Z of Fetish Artists - Franco which fell sharply from 6 to 32 and Mitchell's A-Z of Fetish Artists - Kalabro which dropped from 17 to 29. 

Come and Get It! (about the Royale Studios Archive) also went, with the biggest drop of all, falling from 9 to 106. It has a fantastic, sexy header image but the fall is an understandable consequence of the introduction of the new, separate Royale Studio blog in January last year.

~

7 different years are represented in this year's table

There are no  photographic entries in the list this year, but 4 photo-manipulators, plus the usual mix of cartoons, renders, and traditional art representing an impressive, eclectic range of interests. 

The mitchmen 'Index of Artists' page recorded 10075 hits in 2023, down 19% on 2022, the lowest since 2018. It was still visited often enough to have taken top place if I had included it in the top 20 table above. I'm glad visitors are still finding the index useful and hope it will lead many more newcomers to a fantastic heritage of gay art they didn't know about.