The Weblog Review

My original review of Bingobowden was fatally flawed, it turns out, by a browser glitch which essentially killed part of the blog’s template and “lost” me the archive (Blogspot isn’t very kind when you deploy developer’s built browsers, and especially Mozilla).

Based on what appeared on my screen then, Bingobowden was rather thin and not very promising — but this was not the true blog. I should have suspected what had happened (because there are always telltale signs), but I didn’t.

Naturally, Stuart, Bingobowden’s owner, realizing that his blog had been massacred, was justifiably mad a hell (and said so on his blog on December 9th), and came back for a re-review. Gary responded with a job that, I think, covers all bases completely.

I read gary’s re-review and re-visited Stuart’s handiwork, after being alerted by Brent. I second gary’s 4.5 stars rating. Stuart is on the ball and doing well. And, of course, apologies are in order for the original shotgun blast. Bingobowden

“Its better to have tried than not at all. The finished product might suck, no one may like it or you, but at least you tried and that means you will at least have a foundation for you future success.” Those are Cliffords thoughts on his newly created weblog on November 18th. Personally, I didn’t think it sucked at all.

Clifford’s Weblogsite is fairly new, just about two weeks old, and this site probably would fair a lot better had the author waited a little longer to submit it. I very much did like what is there though. The author writes that he is using his blog as memoir and it has certainly started out that way. His second entry deals with a situation he is in where he is taking a girl, that he’d rather not, to a city wide winter formal. That post in itself is worth a trip to this site, its both hilarious and very intropsective.

The site design is probably one of the most unique I’ve seen. At first I thought it was kind of cumbersome, but the more time I spent there, I started to realize that its design is really user friendly. When first arriving at Clifford’s Weblogsite you are met with the latest entry (and a pretty handy headline telling you when the site was last updated). To see the other posts you have to follow the archives where you are met with a sub-directory where each entry has a brief description and a ranking on how entertaining or important you might find each post. The author was pretty accurate with his rankings as far as I am concerned. When you go to a particular entry, and the subject of the entry is a fairly long one, the author summarizes the subject and than give you a link if you want to read more about it. Sounds cumbersome at first, but pretty handy once you really see how it works.

There’s daily thought section to this blog, and what looks like some other sections such as links, essays and musing, photos, that haven’t been yet created. There’s an interesting section called “ads” where the author puts those required links when you use a guestbook or other service. Thats a pretty nifty idea.

I’m giving Clifford’s Weblogsite a 2, I wish I could give it a better rating, but there is just not enough there to earn anything else. In my opinion the author should have waited a little more before submitting his site, and I hope he resubmits it in the future. I enjoyed the little that was there so much I’ll probably keep tabs on this jounal and rereview a couple months from now. 2 stars, check it out.

Clifford’s weblogsite

Behavioral pshycoholgists, I am told, have already taken an interest in blogging as both a regulating valve and a security blanket. The vast majority of personal blogs falls within either of these categories or both. Broad at Bat, run by Mrs. Broad as our “host/teacher,” is introduced as WOMAN 101, a freshman course, I suppose, flying the standard of a black bat. Right off the bat, with Mrs. Broad swinging, I’d classify this blog as both a regulating valve and a security blanket.

You could, I guess, see Broad at Bat as a mildly funny, whimsical kind of blog where Mrs. Broad communicates her accumulated wisdom on womanhood in general. She gives us only a hint as to how much time she has already spent reading the innards of a woman’s operating instructions:

(On 10/30/02) How old am I? I’m old enough that I’ve done the silly things youth do trying to find their own boundaries. I’m at that place in life where priorities are clear, comfort zones are huge, and I’m more apt to explore depths rather than just breadths. I’ve learned the big, important and expensive lessons. I’ve found myself.

That’s grand… But what does Broad at Bad exactly offer?

I’d suspect that its primary objective is analysis of women’s daily “life strategies” in this harsh, unruly world. Look, for example, at a lengthy post on flirting and teasing that attempts to define the differences between “flirting,” “teasing,” “fooling around,” and “coming on to.” Fine detail here and the audience should be of both sexes, frustrated or not, successful or not. The entire blog (and it’s a relatively young one) is in this exact same tone of “voice” — mildly didactic, sober. Mrs. Broad is really making an effort to sound cool and collected, and she probably is.

I read the following excerpt as Broad at Bat’s cross between a mission statement and a core kernel:

Women are also wonderfully brave and charitable when it comes to imparting their insecurities, their beliefs, and their opinions – like ones on my hairstyle, or how I raise my children – often within hours or days of first meeting me. You just don’t find many men willing to extend themselves like that to a stranger (on 10/15/02).

Powered by Blogger, Broad at Bat has the simplest possible layout. There are only four links of suggested reading and the archive. Writing is straightforward, plain. Mrs. Broad hasn’t any earth-shaking announcements to make. She slowly ploughs through the days, one post at a time.

I felt Broad at Bat was pop soda without the fizz.

But some people adore flat soda.Broad At Bat

In the past year, Erik has moved more times and covered more mileage in his moving from state to state than I’ve ever done in my life. Between all of this moving and the prepping he’s been doing for a marathon, it doesn’t leave him much time to update his weblog. He does do it when he can, though.

There are only 14 entries since December of 2001 until now at ErikSmelser.com. The posts range from happenings in the news to what Erik and his family or friends have been up to from time to time. There’s an additional weblog that touches base on how much Erik’s been running in preparation for an upcoming marathon. That weblog keeps track of the total number of miles he’s ran through the entire year, as well as a weekly total and some of the rather interesting places his runs have taken him – Delaware Park, around lakes, and even to museums.

Erik’s writing is clear and concise. He has very valid points when he shares his news-related opinions and writes them out very clearly for anyone to understand.

I really liked the design of the site. It was the same design used for the regular weblog, as well as the Marathon Training one. The neutral colors Erik uses give the site a very calm appearance and the layout is very easy to navigate through.

This isn’t a very big weblog, and looks as if it’s not going to be updated as frequently as the kind of sites you want to check back on every day. You can read the whole weblog in under 30 minutes, however, so if you’re looking to fill some time with some nice quality reading, this is a site that would fit that bill.

Erik Smelser

Notes from Pure Land Mountain, maintained by Robert Brady, and American living in rural Japan, is an honest effort at what I call “expatriate blogging.” The blogging tool is Blogger and the template is one of the plain jobs offered by same. A white background and a straightforward header. Nothing spectacular, no unnecessary plumage. There are some beautiful pictures and links to Robert’s favorite sites categorized into groups whose descriptive headline always begins with “Pure” — “Pure Japan Blogs,” “Pure Japan Links,” et cetera, et cetera, the “Pure,” I guess, standing as a kind of trademark announcement.

Robert writes at length about his daily routines in countryside Japan. He obviously loves the place. Living in one of the most compact and uniform societies in the world, a society that has traditionally not encouraged foreigners to become residents of the island nation, certainly requires a higher level of commitment and loyalty — and Robert obviously has it. Robert’s posts show that he has immersed himself in the culture and is working consciously to adjust to its complex requirements.

Thus, his interface with Japan is not based on a tourist / visitor mentality and, as a result, he is critical of those from the outside who fail to understand the current predicament of the Japanese. He writes, for example (April 30, 2002):

The cover of a recent issue of Time magazine was on Japan’s Blues. The feature story dealt with Japan as though it were alone on a bleak other planet somewhere, and as though all Japan and the Japanese have done that was worth doing is now at an end, and there is nothing ahead for them. All written by someone from a neoculture with a history of barely 200 years, regarding a culture of millennia. I would say right off that Japan, as a culture, is much more in touch with spirit and place, and knows far more about time, deep time, than anyone in America, let alone some New York journalist who’s been posted here on his way to somewhere else.

I happen to agree completely with this statement.

Robert is a capacious writer. He churns out lengthy posts with noted ease. This product, however, bogs down quickly because of endless sentences and Robert’s apparent dislike of breaking long passages into paragraphs, a style reminiscent of the late W.G. Sebald’s complicated difficult writing structure. Consider this:

But with that part I go on, and try again, and fail again, but when, after a week away I come back to the task, I find that I have learned another little bit, that it too is now part of me, has become intrinsic, is now part of what I know about stones and stone walls, part of what the stones in their limitless patience embody, and with that I go on again, begin to build, and fail, and learn another thing, and so it goes on, as bit by bit what I learn rises up like a stone wall.

I’m sure that Notes would benefit greatly by a simple switch to paragraph format, which will keep the reader focused on the thread of the post rather than the effort not to lose visual continuity of the densely packed text.

Robert is often poetic (see, for example, “Bird Gossip” on November 5, 2002) and sensitive to the “feeling” of Japanese land. He has deep appreciation of the countryside and its many delicate wonders, and declares at the top of his page: “Thank god for all the city folk, who leave the rest of the country to us!” How much I would love to imitate Robert now!

This is an honest blog. If you are a admirer of Japan, or simply a person who wishes to learn more about the country not from a travel brochure, visit Notes. You’ll learn a lot and you’ll enjoy some good, but demanding, writing. Notes from Pure Land Mountain