Note from Josh: I was prepping Jack Bauer for his interview, but he said he hadn’t emotionally recovered from the season finale yet. He also asked me not to disclose his location. He’ll be appearing here in an interview next week, but in the meantime, please enjoy the following items that he helped me put together. The following post occurs at whatever pace you read at.

The show 24 ended recently. I watched every season. The show, and Jack Bauer, taught me a lot about how to survive in the sinister world of blogging. Heed its lessons well and you may too make it out alive.

1. Just do something, quit wringing your hands

You can always expect to be bailed out at the last second, even when it seems like all hope is lost. Just sit down and start typing something. Better to take action then spend life regretting inaction. Or getting stabbed in the eye.

2. EMPs are hell on Wordpress

If someone uses an electromagnetic pulse device in your vicinity, not only will it throttle all of your surveillance equipment, but you’ll certainly be unable to publish your next blog post about how underrated the convenience store hot dog is.

3. You can’t make everyone talk

Try, try, and try again…sometimes there just aren’t going to be any comments. Begging someone for information or to join your book club is beneath you, but outright coercion via the Internet is a tough gig.

4. Keep an eye on the assistants and analysts

A lot of fancy upper-tier bloggers talk about their virtual assistants and helpers in India. If 24 taught me anything, it’s that your lackeys and analysts are always the ones who will garrote you and stuff your body in a ventilation shaft. That’s why I went rogue. I work best alone. I work poorly while garroted and dead.

5. It’s best not to have a boss

Eventually, you’ll have to go against their orders and take them hostage. Or worse, a well-spoken British baddie might demand that you execute your boss in a depressing shipping yard. Again, best to go it alone.

6. Don’t kiss anyone or they’ll die at the hands of assassins

Once you get traffic, you’ll have fans. Some of those fans might want to kiss you. Resist them for their own sakes.

7. Avoid time traps

You have a posting schedule to keep and bad men to foil. Getting menaced by cougars in the woods will truly screw up your productivity. Avoid unnecessary distractions, like mountain lion snares and Bejeweled 2.

8. Don’t let anyone implant a chip in your arm as part of a link exchange

Wake up. Sooner or later someone will surely chop that arm off and then you’ll be typing with your face while holding a crayon in your mouth.

9. Keep your family separate from your work

I have two cousins who were once unable to work at the same Things Remembered engraving kiosk in a shopping mall. And yet, the people involved in protecting the country from terrorists on 24 were all either related, sleeping together, married, or otherwise fraught with personal entanglements.

In other words, don’t let family members read your blog. Mark them as spam and ban them, for their own good.

10. First impressions matter

Whether the season that followed each season premier was great or just sucked, I thought the premier episodes were always fantastic. The lesson? As long as the first paragraph of a blog post is good enough, you’ve got a good chance at people sticking around for the next few months.

11. The more attractive you are, the more tank-tops you’ll be forced to wear

It’s easy to avoid being good-looking online. Stay anonymous behind your screen and your passing will be less wrenching and exploitable, particularly if tank-tops are not your style.

12. Use your drones

Who knew that retasking satellites could be so easy? They can spy on anyone at a moment’s notice. This is how I use Facebook and Twitter–to keep tabs on anyone who is about to betray me.

13. Go further than the next blogger

If they’re responding to comments, you send emails. If they write 10 posts a week, you write 10 posts an hour. If they schedule posts days in advance, you write in real time at typing speed. And if they say something bad about you online, you hire mercenaries to teach them a lesson. Word will get around.

Josh