Happy Birthday To Us: Franklin Avenue Turns 10

Remember when blogs were the hot new thing? Before Facebook, before Twitter... hell, even before MySpace was oh-so-briefly the craze, people were blogging. We got into the game rather late, on March 4, 2003, way after many folks had started doing it. But soon after, the whole blogging thing really took off. Remember the 2005 L.A. Times Calendar section cover story The New Faces of The City? Franklin Avenue was included in a small roundup of L.A. blogs worth checking out, several of which now no longer exist.

I still remember the thrill I got in the early days of the blog, checking our stats constantly to see if people were showing up -- and where they were coming from. And when we'd get linked to by another, bigger blog? Amazing. It was the late, lamented LA Examiner that first inspired me to blog, and when the guys over there (Matt Welch and Ken Layne) gave us one of our first big links, driving tons of traffic to Franklin Avenue, I was hooked.

Now the web is so loud and noisy -- and lousy with millions of blogs and websites -- I must admit, some of that thrill is gone. And I probably spend more time updating and caring for my Twitter feed than the blog a lot of the time. But social media has at least given bloggers a platform to drive traffic back to their sites. And I still do get giddy when one of my posts picks up steam and gets linked on megasites. Recently, my post about the LA Times dropping TV listings did that. So did my YouTube video of the prank caller to KCBS.

Ten years later, we've reviewed nearly 300 restaurants, have held seven editions of The Great Los Angeles Walk, helped throw a wake for the Ambassador Hotel and spawned two Blogger Kids, among many other things. It's hard to believe it's been ten years. Thanks for joining us on this journey.

Here's how we marked our 5th anniversary, and here's the underwhelming post that started it all.