The Weblog Review

I was hoping I would get into this site, but sad to say it wasn’t the blog that got my attention.

The layout for “paranoise” is kinda funky. There’s a bit of some blinking action going on that it becomes distracting, especially the little flashing boxes next to each new post that is written. The last thing I want to see when reading a site in general is blinking things. The title is made with Macromedia and again has flashing little letters, jiggling along the side of the blog which I thought were supposed to lead me to other parts of the site, but they didn’t.

Blog wise … the posts are fairly short; a few sentences everyday. I didn’t get a sense of who this twenty-something male was from Canada. Though I guess it’s good he updates almost everyday, but they’re more like brief updates informing the reader what music he’s listening to, what he did the night before, a few internet links here and there, and so on.


In addition to the blog, there are links to music, other blogs, a weekly song you can listen to and an “insight” section which I found most interesting to read. It had reviews, trips and more which give you more to read than his blog. I wish his blog was more like this.

Overall, this site was mediocre, nothing really too much to rave about. paranoise

Everyone has in their mind, what they think makes a good weblog. The link lists they post are there for a reason, each person has standards. I have them too, and I have to say it has been awhile since one has lived up to them.

Sunshine more than lives up to them.

When you go to Sunshine, you are greeted with a nice simple layout, that features fresh colors and a cute sunshine graphic on the left. It is cheery, and welcoming. On the left is your standard column of links, and information. This is where you learn the author is an Indian woman, who is proud of her heritage. You can also find links to the articles she has written for rediff.com

All that is just filler, the good stuff is in the posts. Nidhi (it means treasure) really likes to blog, her posts are frequent and with good length. She talks about everything from saving money, to how much she enjoys Harry Potter, and how her weblog has gotten her in touch with people from her past. Her posts are written with an intelligent voice, and she touches on issues in her life such as her family, and religion. She writes about everyday life things, but it doesn’t feel that way, and that folks is the point of a weblog.

It has been a pleasure to meet her (and you really do feel like you meet her when you first visit) and to add her to my own personal bookmark list.Sunshine

Cogito Ergo Sum is a no frills weblog that at first glance appears clean and appealing to the eyes. The site is fully dedicated to the blog and its existence though I have to confess the clouds background gave me a feeling that an old installation of Windows 95 had resurfaced and was trying to battle against my NT operating system! Good-sized fonts made it easy to read for my radiation scorched eyes and a nice set out made it a inviting to read.



The blog itself is nothing different that you wouldn’t find on pretty much any other blog, basically the day-to-day livings of Jenneferre, the owner of the blog. Its intelligently written, which came as a bit of a surprise after reading through several less then spectacular blogs from other sites, and yes, I did find the material somewhat interesting. The thing that I really liked about the site was that it didn’t center around whining, raving or ranting but purely the events of the day and sometimes a bit of reflections to place everything in perspective.



The template of the weblog is good enough, its neat and tidy, and certainly not distracting. I’m not too sure exactly what the point of the [+] sign was next to the author and the date, I clicked it and nothing happened, and clicked some other ones and sometimes all it did was center the current post. Hardly a feature needed. There was no room to add some comments to each post, something that I’m sure Jenneferre may consider adding at some point down the track.



There’s a few other links to friends site, though I found it annoying that it didn’t open a new window when I clicked on them so I had to use my Shift key to ensure Cogito Ergo Sum didn’t get lost behind another site. Again, when writing a blog there HAS to be a small ‘About Me’ section somewhere, if only to say how old and where you’re from. I had to scan through several entries to find out how old she exactly was, which of course makes a different interpretation to the blog. Not having this information at hand was terribly annoying, so again, another thing she may want to keep in mind.



All up I’d say Cogito Ergo Sum gets the thumbs up from me and anyone else in their teenage years or early 20’s. With a few other areas added as I mentioned above to support the weblog I’m sure it would be even more enjoyable to read. I give the site a 3 out of 5. Cogito Ergo Sum

Her name is Melissa Simpson and “random.rationale” is the name of her game. At an age of twenty-two years old, she is attending the University of Idaho and nearing the graduation date pretty darn quickly. Melissa is looking to receive a degree in graphic design. She likes skiing, baking homemade bread and taking bubble baths (interesting combination). Most importantly she is also into Space Ghost. This is definitely a really good start.



Her weblog looks sharp and effective, pleasing mix of colors, splitting the white canvas of the page in two with all elements shifted to the left, interesting and clear with a harmonic use of colors. There is even a small picture of her at the top of each page, making the weblog just that much more personal. This is not one of those flashy weblogs that seem to be infecting the Internet lately. It is sweet and simple, and it works.



Melissa has not been writing for that long (she started in January of this year), so there isn’t that much she has been able to collect yet. You might say that most of her material can easily be covered in one sitting. The weblog is almost entirely personal stuff centered on herself, most of the entries in one way or other dealing with the upcoming stuff leading up to her graduation. Her entries are pretty good, but nothing exceptional. Not extensive, but okay for what she obviously intended the weblog to be for herself which is just to collect her own thoughts for herself. A typical entry goes like this: “i woke up saturday morning after decidedly having a crappy evening before… but i didn’t care anymore. that’s the nice thing about a fresh start to a new day. your perspective looks different in the morning, and your worries (sometimes) appear much smaller than they had before. this was one of those occasions.”



While she has experience in graphic design for multimedia and more traditional themes, this talent is not reflected very well in her weblog. This is a shame as her portfolio of earlier web designs is pretty good. As a busy student, I can understand her main concern is covering the content of the entries, which is good enough. All energy into that fancy graphical stuff is more than likely being used up in busy classes and exams.



This is all right, but do not expect more. It is not philosophy, nor does it provide deep analysis of recent events. Except for her big toe, that is. In the “toe saga continues” we are shown a close-up picture of big toe after stubbing it on an iron lying on the floor. Okay, it is purple and obviously throbbing from the pain. Is this personal or what?



There are alot of other links leading outside of her weblog, and one is tempted to look around the rest of her homepage. Indeed, there is lots of other interesting stuff on her site. But since it is beyond the scope of this review that by definition must be limited to the weblog, I will only mention them here, that they accent her weblog well.



So in the words of Space Ghost, “Greetings all you weblog citizens, Zorak and I invite all you out from coast to coast to check this place out.”random.rationale

When first visiting ‘Play’ you are greeted with a basic layout, hosted by blogspot, with most of the content going down the center of the blog with a few links to the right. Nothing flashy, which is good, and it definatly serves this site well.



I would call ‘Play’ a link blog, and one of the more interesting ones I’ve seen. It promises the wierdest news and coolest links, and does not fall short of meeting that promise. The authors post links to different stories and sites they found with some hilarious commentary about them. Until I visited this site I never saw a house cat as large as watermelon (worth a visit in itself), or would have concieved that there was a website out there dedicated to writing poetry about Leo Dicaprio.



The authors ‘gel’ well together, I actually didn’t notice that it was more than one author until I was halfway through the archives. Their writing is funny and descriptive of each link you are going to be visiting.



All in all, it is a very entertaining, very funny site, definatly worth a visit. I would recommend the I.E. browser, many of the links you will visit will not work without it, and I would not visit this site if you are at work or near young children, some of the links lead you to adult content (a few with audio that begins when the page is loaded).



Play