The Weblog Review

I wouldn’t associate the word ‘Drakulita’ with the Rainbow Brite girl, however the author has decided to use her as the main site image imposed on a kitchen tablecloth-like background. My first impressions on the layout are good; colourful, structured, organised, easy to navigate, however I have an unnerving feeling that it may be one of those ‘candy pop-teen sites’ that dominate the web these days. I read through the first page; its not that bad, but its not that good either..

The first post I read states that she’s away for a week or so, and following that, a few non-substantial brief posts including links to quizzes, threads and also a page of ‘100 things about Drakulita’. A great vehicle to discover more about her. I skim read a few & they illustrated the life of a normal teenager; aspirations, music and quotes.. from artists; namely Alisha’s Attic and Norah Jones. There are also quite a few baby pictures of her which are also sweet, but I can’t say that there was anything there which particularly drew me.

The blog is laced with a few animated emoticons which makes a difference and goes well with the theme, however they can be slightly annoying after a while. In attempt to view the March archive (the other archive pages seem fine), I got a bunch of gobbledy gook before the actual entries, which implies that something has seriously gone wrong with the template or publishing program. This put me off reading the entries themselves as the format was destroyed but as I continued I realised that much of the content was the same. Obviously its all focused around the author and her friends however a visitor may find it difficult initially to settle in with the content as she mentions several different people with little indication of who they are at times.

I finally take a look at the ‘about’ page, and learn she’s an 18 year old girl called ‘Raquel’ or ‘Quel’ and where the peculiar name ‘Drakulita’ came from. (Some of this info is on the main page anyway, however this is in more detail). The page also contains a variety of group pictures & baby pictures and proves rather interesting. Also appreciate the basis of her layout ’18 and counting’, which I’d advise reading. I guess its easier to relate to her finally ‘becoming’ of age and expressing that on the layout by illustrating it with old and new pictures of herself and her friends.

General impression I have of this site is that although she’s come of age, she’s holding onto her childhood memorabilia, which is brilliant. In the future I’d like to return to the site and see some evidence of maturation in both her writing and layout. The blog proves great communication to those who know her (on and offline), but for any external visitor it’s not necessarily an incentive to return or even get involved in. Unfortunately some of the subjects I’ve read, I may have related to about 5 years ago, but now it is of little interest.drakulita: eighteen and counting.

Firstly, let’s talk about the design. The layout isn’t too spectacular but it shifts the main focus to the content. It’s rather user-friendly and is laden with quotes and links. There was a little problem with the archives and I could not access the entries in March, but I figured out that it was a URL problem. Maybe the author can work on that?

This blog can be summarised by the few words stated by the author, Carl Heppenstall, at the side of the blog. They are, “Politics, Philosophy, Music, Racecars {#88!), Anti-Money Laundering, Fraud Prevention, A slight amount of monkey business, and Maybe A Little Poetry, Overall, Pro-U.S.” These words form the basis of the content in the blog.

Although this blog has been classified as ‘Personal’, I would prefer to label it as a ’News/Links’ blog. Truly personal posts on the author are sporadic and short. Most entries consist of quotations from articles, links and personal comments from the author, which tend to lean towards the political side of things. I have to admit that the author does know what he is talking about.

Be warned though. Politics is a very subjective topic and not every reader may agree with the author’s opinions. So it’s recommended that you read a few entries before totally jumping into the blog. If you like what the author is saying, then this would make a really good read especially since the author updates regularly with multiple posts and insightful links. However, if politics do not appeal to you, or if you do not like what is being posted, then stay clear.

Between The Coasts

www.thebwit.com is a dedicated site by a dedicated person. Its layout is frequently redesigned, and the webmaster self-checks for originality and, well, dedication. Plus the latest layout features an entire sidebar dedicated to TheBwit’s dedicated exercise routines which is part of his dedicated plan to slim down and tone up. Whew. Now that’s dedication for you.

First, lets get all the bad points out of the way. While this frequent re-vamping of the site’s appearance is good and heightens reader interest, it is a nuisance when you click on the archive links to find out that you can’t read some parts of it because another layout was used when those archived posts were blogged. For example, the current design has a divider between the exercise blog and the main blog, which means the main blog is somewhere in the middle. For older posts, there was no exercise blog and thus the blog was aligned to the left. So now we have a black line running through the text and a huge emerald buddha (current design) obscuring words and being eyesores when we read archived posts in the current layout. Also, there are quite a few sprinklings of misspelled and misused words on TheBwit, which sometimes hinder readability.

Now, on to the good parts. This site features quite a lot of discussions about the blogging world, with comments back and forth by readers and friends of TheBwit. The discussions are usually insightful and illuminating, though sometimes the talk gets a bit too ‘insider-y’ and the casual reader gets lost. Another good point is that TheBwit maintains a nice mix of posts about his personal life and posts about his opinions and views about the world (both real and virtual, with more emphasis on virtual). This way, the reader does not overdose quite that easily. Also, there is a very long list of all the DVDs TheBwit owns on the site. I’m not sure what it’s there for, but it does look mighty impressive sitting there. Perhaps if TheBwit started reviewing movies it would be there to lend some credibility.

In summary, other than the inconvenience caused by template changes, there is nothing wrong with www.thebwit.com. Content-wise, although engaging and informative on a whole, it would appeal more to blogging and programming enthusiasts. For those who want to know what it takes to be a dedicated webmaster (TheBwit runs several sites, including I Own These), head over right now.

TheBwit

Heatdeath sounds like some horrible ancient torture ritual, but the sadistic among you can give it a miss as this site is described by its author as being about music and culture. There is no explanation for the title, which I’d have liked as it is an intriguing one.

This site is relatively new on the weblog scene, starting out at the beginning of March. So far there is very little content but what I’ve seen looks promising. Heatdeath boasts good writing style and music reviews that wouldn’t go amiss in NME. It is currently focused solely on music, but with the author talking about bringing in political posts that could all change. I personally think it works best just in music mode.

The layout used is a basic Blogger template in white and grey. This simple layout takes nothing away from the writing but adds nothing either. For a specialist page Heatdeath needs more structure. A content list would be very useful, so that a reader could instantly jump to a subject or band that interests them. Also, a template that involves music in some way would add a lot. This is a site that is worth going to, but it needs some improvements to keep you coming back.

With the quality of music reviews and writing this is a site that could easily gather a good following. The author has already begun experimenting with HTML, so give this weblog time and it could become a first stop for all those with a keen interest in music.
Heat Death

I decided that I would review this site because of the name. Ramblings of a Technology Addict sounds a lot like something I wish I would have thought of when starting my own blog. I figured this site has to be about technology based on the title.

That is not what I got. Instead I got a mix of technology, war, personal, and general blog ramblings through out the blog. It is a well written blog with frequent updates for the better part of most days. The best posts, however, were those that were about technology. I didn’t like seeing all the normal mumbo jumbo within this blog as it didn’t flow. Scratch that. Put the technology stuff in one blog, and the rest of it in another and you have two good blogs that flow, separately.

The design is a complete shrine to Apple OS X and the author does not try to hide his love of the Macintosh. At the top of the screen we have the “menu bar” that one would see on a laptop, but somewhat customized. I was a little confused with all of the mini icons that had a link to Apple’s page, specifically the Jaguar OS page. Why? Past that point the blog is in a two column layout using only CSS. If the content is not long enough, some of the “navigation columns” content gets put under the blog. The links to other sites are listed in an iTunes listing which was just another addition to the Macintosh shrine.

I did have one major problem with the site and that is with the archives. Each day is archived instead of each week or month so it made it very hard to see where he had been versus where he is now. It became very time consuming to go through each day’s worth of entries instead of being able to read a month’s worth at a time.

Over all we have a fairly good weblog. As I stated I think it should be about technology and not a personal blog. If the author has the ability to categorize the posts it would make it a little better and would have much better flow to it. So if you are a technology buff or just looking for a good site to read, then check it out and see what Ramblings of a Technology Addict has to offer.
Ramblings of a Technology Addict