The Weblog Review

One of my favorite things I do when reviewing any weblog is to jump right into the archives, starting at the very beginning. Usually this gives me a good idea why someone has joined the ranks of the blogging public, and it helps explain things that might be mentioned later on in the site. Right away, I knew where this author was coming from when he mentioned how much he looked up to his cousins when he was a kid because they were “cool”. I still look up to my “cool” cousin and admire her in just the ways Steve, the author of American Drifter, described in this September 2004 post.

In a July 2005 post, Steve is posting about a review he received about his site. In his overview of this review, he mentions this: “I do not write this blog for other people – I write it for myself. It has become more of a journal that I want to reflect back on years from now – to remember a point in time when I was transforming myself from one person, into another.” This is one of the best answers to blogging I’ve ever read. It not only describes why Steve blogs, but also what he hopes to come of logging into Blogger on a regular basis and giving us all material to read.

The rest of the posts here are in a different type of format. Instead of posting something as soon as it pops into his head, it appears as if he stores up all of these varied topics and then when he finally gets a chance to sit down and write, he throws them all into one entry. Sometimes they include pictures from the internet, rants about his daily life, or just an update on what is on his agenda for the next few days. There are other posts that are written like a short story – albeit a very short story – with his use of narrative and detailed descriptions.

The archives are spotty. The first post is dated July 2004, but then the writing takes a small hiatus until September. The blog is again put on hold until March 2005, which is where the somewhat regular posts begin.

My only disappointment of the site was the layout. It’s a standard Blogger template, and standard is the last thing I would expect after reading Steve’s posts. He has taken the time to customize it again with an animated GIF at the top – yes, I said animated. It’s a small one, so it thankfully doesn’t distract from the site like the animated GIFs of years ago. The typical links to the archives and other favorite websites are scattered down the right-hand column, which runs along side the main portion of the weblog. The design does not distract from the content, but I would still love to see something as inimitable as Steve’s writing somehow incorporated into the design.

This is a hard weblog to give a ranking. With his years of writing experience, obviously the site is very competently written. Since there’s such a wide range of age groups and interest levels in the blog-reading world, it’s unfortunate that the writing will probably go ignored by web-surfers looking for a quick weblog to read from time to time. These entries are ones that don’t read quickly. The majority are ones that are long, detailed oriented, and descriptively written.
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The first thing I noticed when I logged into this website was that the profile, links and other information had inadvertently been pushed to the bottom end of the blog; quite appropriate for a blog talking about life in Alaska! Whatever the case, as I began to read, I discovered an outsiders views on Alaskan living (originally from Utah).

This blog is worth a look just for the ice and snow. It is worth quoting Jill to give you a feel for it… “There were a couple new inches of powder on the road and I had to earn every pedal stroke – but it’s no worse than thick mud” regarding her ride through powder snow. The gratuitous Moose picture is also worth a look. Jill also usefully dispels a few myths about Alaska. Eg: Alaska is cold not frigid; Alaska is not full of hippies; Alaskans don’t shoot polar bears for dinner and so on.

This site is really meant to be a diary – somehow, as mentioned above, the old Blogger template has gone awry, nonetheless, the journalistic aspect is clear and the pictures are good. So, in terms of design of this site, no brownie points. Still, if you can find them, there are some links to other blogs, in particular those of an Alaskan ilk and some links to copy editors, Jill’s alter ego.

Obviously, Jill’s site is a personal, and an outsider’s initial discoveries of a new place, which lends it a possibly clearer timbre than that of someone who was born and bred in the snow. Whilst her web is technically of no particular interest, it shows promise for its sheer readability. I’m giving it a 3.75. NULL

I read this entire site from start to finish yesterday. There are only four months of archives, so it wasn’t that long of a process. However, since yesterday, I’ve not been able to come up with anything to write about this site. And that’s definitely not like me.

The design is a little more cut and dry to write about, so let’s start with that. Thankfully, the design is unique. The color scheme of grays and blacks obviously go along well with the site’s name – The Gray Tie. At first glance, I didn’t notice the background, but as I scrolled down to read each entry, it became more and more distracting from the actual content of the weblog. The layout is set up in two columns. Weblog entries fill the main column, which is bordered next to an extremely long side column full of a colossal list of links. There are so many links in the sidebar – ranging from categorized archives to links the author supports to random weblogs – that it ends up being longer than the actual weblog portion of the site.

Readers never really learn a lot about the author. I only learned her name was Carol by reading some of the comments other readers have left. From the posts, it’s safe to assume that she leans heavily toward the right-hand side of the political arena, with plenty of links to different Republican party affiliated sites. Sparsely scattered throughout the site are brief mentions of her two kids – Glorious Girlchild and Magnificent Manchild. The posts where she does mention her kids and her every day life are a good break from the serious nature of the rest of her posts.

The subject matter of The Gray Tie isn’t one that will interest everyone. Carol does a lot of linking to other news sites. Sometimes these posts are unique news items, like the kids in Pennsylvania who had to re-use plastic utensils at their school cafeteria. The majority of the time, though, she focuses on more serious issues – Cindy Sheehan chaining herself to the White House, students being suspended for making anti-gay comments, or quite often the severity of sex crimes against children.

This isn’t a site I would visit again. A good number of the posts are just excerpts taken off of a news article, followed by the actual link and maybe a few word about Carol’s personal opinion on the matter. Sometimes, there’s just a link. I don’t want to discredit Carol’s writing ability, because when she posts, it’s very well written. I just think if she would showcase more of her own feelings and thoughts, rather than copy so much from news articles, readers would be able to connect a little more easily to The Gray Tie.
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This is a non-weblog weblog. It is a static website with photo albums. There are no dated entries and no text, but lots of photos and one page under the link “other applications” called, “Your Salary according to Romanian legislation.” Since I don’t live in Romania, I didn’t spend too much time figuring out what this was.

The site has a couple nifty design features. You can choose the “color set” and the language for the page. The default color set is the much-loved black, which is my least favorite, but there are seven other choices : white, blue, yellow, grey, orange, green, and navy. Each color set is accessed from a handy pull-down menu in the upper left corner of the page. When you change colors, you also get a new set of photos on the home page. The language choices are German, English, Italian or Romanian. You may change the language by clicking on a flag representing the country where the language is spoken (US for English).

The writing on the page gives the briefest possible description of the photos. There might be one word–the name of city where the photo was taken–or simply a category assignment, such as “animals,” “landscapes,” “autumn,” or “Black Sea coast.” There is no further explanation beyond dates and the name of the person who took the photo.

There is no order to the page and no explicit purpose other than to display the photographs. It appears to be a personal site that a few friends use to upload their photos. There are hundreds of public photos, but there is a link to “private photos” that is password protected.

I’m not sure who the audience for this site is. Some of the photos are pretty and might be worth a look. Since the site is not a weblog, I’m not sure how to rate it. I give a 3.5 for effort.

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The first thing I noticed when I got to this site was the Google ad at the top of the page. Soon after that I noticed that this is another Blogger blog, but not with one of the Minima layouts (or Scribe… I don’t like that one either) so I guess I can’t complain too much about that. As I skim through I notice a few other instances of ads that aren’t even blended in very well. This isn’t a great start, but I’ll try to look past the first impression for a second.

The posts are informative and range from features Blogger releases to the newest version of Firefox. They aren’t extremely interesting, and they’re full of links that I suspect may be sponsored, but they do let you know about what’s going on. Some of the spelling is a little off but I’m willing to look past that.

The template is, as I said, a Blogger stadard, but not one of the extremely overused ones. There aren’t many links aside from the ones in the posts, and the ones that are there are mainly to particular posts in this blog.

There are a few extras, most of them being ads or statistics plugins. There’s what I assume is a counter at the bottom, and there’s the I Power Blogger logo. Other than that, it’s pretty empty.

If you’re into technological things or South India (since there is a post or two about the local stuff as well), you might want to look into this blog. Otherwise, you might just end up getting overwhelmed by the ads and links and not really know where to go from there. It’s definitely not a bad blog, and I may end up checking it out again. I have to give it a 3 out of 5, because it won’t exactly be something everyone can relate to, but you should at least check it out to see if it appeals to you. Who knows, it may be a keeper.

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