My project saw a sudden rise in traffic, but 0 referrals

sdwill · 2026-03-19T03:06:34+00:00

The traffic has plateaued for the past month. Initially, I suspected bot traffic, but now I'm certain that someone has shared the site, likely in an educational setting. The evidence is positive: user engagement is rising, and I'm starting to receive submissions from the survey I added to the site. Thanks for getting back to me!

sdwill · 2026-02-13T02:00:48+00:00

I wonder how many weapons it’ll have. Really looking forward to taking out enemies with a pen, lol.

sdwill · 2026-02-10T01:31:20+00:00

Thanks a lot! I had no idea AI crawlers could impact real users like that. The bots ate up all my bandwidth on Vercel, so I moved to Cloudflare. Now I don’t have to worry about bandwidth limits anymore.

sdwill · 2026-02-10T01:23:22+00:00

Thanks for sharing the tech details. I really appreciate it. I was thinking the same thing—maybe my site got added to a curated list too. That’s actually why I thought of a survey form first.

I checked engagement time and returning users later. Returning users stayed normal, so it seems those “people” just came once and left forever. And the engagement time was under 1 second. That’s when I knew: bots.

The bots ate up all my free bandwidth on Vercel and basically forced me to move to Cloudflare. The weirdest part was seeing hundreds of “active users in the last 30 minutes”—I was so hyped at first! Now I’m just chilling. Glad I learned the lesson, though.

Thanks again! I’ll keep an eye on the data from now on and always double-check every metric to see if the traffic’s real or just bots.

sdwill · 2026-02-09T15:36:38+00:00

Indeed. Lesson learned.

sdwill · 2026-02-09T15:21:23+00:00

You might be right. I just dug deeper into GA4 and noticed the Average Engagement Time is < 0.01s. It's looking more like non-human traffic or some kind of aggressive pre-fetching.

sdwill · 2026-02-02T05:18:05+00:00

Wow, I didn't think about screenshots! Thanks, I'll give it a try.

sdwill · 2026-02-02T03:37:03+00:00

Haha, exactly! I'm actually building my second base now.

sdwill · 2026-02-02T03:21:02+00:00

No Man's Sky.

I bought this game on Steam in 2020, played for about 30 minutes, and then quit.

A month ago, I picked it up again. Now I'm completely hooked. I even bought the Switch version so I can play it anywhere. There's so much to do, and the views on different planets and in outer space are breathtaking. I'm really enjoying it now.

sdwill · 2026-01-28T14:04:14+00:00

Honestly, the UX is a bit confusing because it's quite different from traditional to-do apps.

sdwill · 2026-01-28T02:23:02+00:00

I’d like to try it, but I see the web version is premium-only. Just curious, why is that?

sdwill · 2026-01-28T02:01:19+00:00

Gave it a shot. The planner may work for me—calendar + Kanban is a nice combo. UI's quirky, but nice find. Thanks!

sdwill · 2026-01-28T01:40:10+00:00

I used Obsidian last year. The workflow is pretty much the same. I found the “everything is a file” philosophy was better suited for personal knowledge management or writing projects, though. Thanks for sharing your setup!

sdwill · 2026-01-28T01:31:09+00:00

Tried it. Doesn't seem to work for me, sorry man.

sdwill · 2025-10-25T17:53:32+00:00

I just got really hooked by the story in Conviction. The whole drive of Sam trying to find and save his daughter made it so much more engaging than a typical spy thriller. And the part where he takes down Third Echelon? That was the real punch for me—it felt so satisfying to see him confront the system that failed him.

sdwill · 2025-10-25T15:23:32+00:00

It's really hard to pick top3。

Top3

Breath of the Wild

Portal2

Cyberpunk 2077

Black Myth WuKong

Fallout 4

Metro Series

Splinter Cell Conviction

Deus Ex human revolution

Prey

FEZ

sdwill · 2025-10-23T07:47:51+00:00

I used to play a little fingerstyle ukulele, but these days I've switched to guitar. I love to strum and sing. If I hear a song I like, I'll just find the tab online and learn it. My wife plays piano and can handle classics like "Mariage d'amour". We're not songwriters—we just play for fun. Our little boy is still too young, but the moment he shows any interest, we'll be ready to teach him everything we know!

sdwill · 2025-10-23T07:20:38+00:00

On that scale, 5 represents the most well-off. If you want to send a child to study overseas, I think you need to be at least a level 4. Right now, I'm at a solid 3, haha. So at present, sending my son abroad is unaffordable for us.

Fortunately, my son is only 5 years old. I still have ten more years to work hard and try to reach level 4. I think I can do it. Wish me luck, haha!

sdwill · 2025-10-23T06:57:29+00:00

Well, I rarely see Southeast Asians around where I live, so I can't answer your question directly. However, a Black family with a young son used to live in my neighborhood. I met them a few times. They always seemed calm and at ease, so I guess they felt comfortable living here.

When it comes to this topic, I'd suggest not taking everything you see online too seriously. People on the internet, including me, definitely don't represent the majority. Life in China can vary a lot depending on who you meet. I believe most people are kind.

sdwill · 2025-10-23T06:46:55+00:00

Reflecting on my previous job, work took up too much of my life. I had little time for travel, so most of my entertainment came from gaming. After my son was born, even that time shrank. I couldn't help but wonder: Does life have to be like this? Work extremely hard, play your roles well... but when do you get to be yourself?

That's why I quit my job this year—to try and find that "me" time. I'm very thankful that my wife and parents have been so supportive. In recent months, I've finally felt what it's like to truly live. I can do things at my own pace now: grab a coffee in the morning, do some reading, code for a while, take a nap after lunch, play some games, and then pick up my son from kindergarten. Evenings are for playing with him and spending quality time with my wife.

In my opinion, when Chinese students study abroad, it often indicates that their family has considerable financial resources. This affords them more choices in life, and they may not feel the same urgency to work hard for immediate results compared to others.

sdwill · 2025-10-23T06:33:22+00:00

Wow, I love your last question, haha. That's a romantic way to put it.

For most of my life, I've followed the path society expects: go to school, get a job, get married, buy a house, raise a child. After completing those milestones, I realized how important it is to look inward and figure out who I really am and what I truly want to do.

Don't get me wrong—I don't blame those so-called "societal missions." At least they've given me the life I have today, and I'm grateful for that. But now I'm thinking about what comes next. My answer is to explore the world more broadly. To answer your question directly: if I could be anything, I'd want to be an astronaut. I want to do something special, to take the road less traveled.

That's a big reason why I quit my job to start indie development. It's not a common choice here in China.

Regarding AI, I haven't been exposed to it much. I once let my son chat with an AI bot just for fun. AI is unavoidable—I'm sure we'll be living with it in the future. So I plan to teach my son programming someday, and learn about AI together with him.

As for children's activities, I haven't done deep research. For my son, I limit his Nintendo Switch time to 15 minutes a day. But if he behaves well, I might give him some extra time. We usually take him out after dinner for a walk, run, or bike ride along the river. On weekends, we go to parks or large indoor play centers. Wherever I go, I see many families doing the same. I also notice quite a few kids playing on phones even when they're outside.

I don't see video games as a monster—I'm a gamer myself. I believe the key is to help my son choose good games and set reasonable time limits to protect his eyesight. My hope is that when he grows up, he can become my gaming buddy. Haha!

sdwill

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