By: Dave Astor WashingtonPost.com wasn't one of the Web sites experiencing a big surge in traffic after becoming the sixth URL mentioned in last week's "Doonesbury" sequence.
Garry Trudeau's Saturday comic sent readers to a 2003 George Will column titled "A Questionable Kind of Conservatism."
"We didn't get a huge spike," reported Eric Easter, senior manager, communications for WashingtonPost.com. He added that the small increase in traffic might or might not have been caused by "Doonesbury."
Why not a bigger spike? Easter said Saturday newspapers usually attract fewer readers than editions from other days, and that the URL listed in "Doonesbury" was so long it might have discouraged some people from typing it into their computers. Also, one comic-strip mention would tend to have more impact on a smaller site than on a high-traffic one such as WashingtonPost.com.
Still, Easter said WashingtonPost.com staffers were happy for the mention from Trudeau. "When we heard he was doing this with other sites, our first reaction was, 'Hey, do us, too!'"
How did Will feel about having his name and 2003 piece referenced in the Saturday strip? An assistant said the Washington Post Writers Group columnist was too busy to comment today.
Will was also tweaked by Trudeau. A young computer user pictured in the comic expresses reluctance to read Will because he's "afraid ... of being really bored." To which an adult character replies: "Suck it up, son! This is important!"
In each installment of the Oct. 11-16 sequence, Trudeau steered readers to a different URL featuring a piece critical of George W. Bush and his policies from a writer or source that would be expected to support the president.
"Doonesbury" appears in 1,400 newspapers via Universal Press Syndicate.
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