Month: January 1970

Spriteboy is a 20-something actor living in a New York apartment with “Gorgeous Roommate” Jen. He says “yay” and talks about “boobs.” Often. Remind you of anyone? Unfortunately, this NY actor [and star of “Mission: Idiot”] doesn’t have the censorship of a large US TV company, and I did find a few comments that I, personally, found offensive. Overall, though, he seems a pretty amiable bloke.

He mostly writes about daily life, such as an upcoming audition or the actresses staying in the hotel he works in [porn and regular]. Unlike most personal blogs, I never got any sense of his personality through the writing, which seemed contradictory in places. In one post we are told that the author disagrees with the war his country is fighting, and the next we are told how proud he is to be American followed by a picture of the American flag and a few quite ignorant comments about the Iraqi people.

I have to admit that from the pictures at the top of the screen Spriteboy does look quite elfin, but then they have all been heavily altered with a run-of-the-mill image-editing tool. I like to see sites where people make the effort despite not having a degree in graphic design and £900 of image editing software [I, myself, am included in this ‘work on a budget category’], but it does mean you don’t get the crisp , professional look. Still, this is a weblog and by its nature is not professional.

The layout of the journal doesn’t run like other journals. Instead you are faced with the archive page, with descending dates and titles, and you read through a page at a time. This makes it hard work and would only take a minor adjustment to improve the readability a whole lot.

Spriteboy World is your average weblog. If you have something in common with the author, or are really desperate to get with an aspiring actor in the hope that someday he’ll make it and not dump you for a size 2 blonde, then this could well be the weblog for you.Spriteboy World

When I saw ‘Word War Bush – anti war humor”, that was exactly what I expected from World War Bush (WWB) – humor. Some George Bush jokes. I was disappointed.

Humor is arguably one of the most powerful weapons to advance your arguments, especially when you are dealing with a rather serious topic. It gets people to lighten up, become less tense and thus more open to other ideas and opinions which might normally insult and anger them. Not to mention that it makes boring issues easier to digest. That is why “Stupid White Men” became a bestseller. That is why WWB has so much potential.

If WWB sticks to humor when it sends whatever messages it wants to send across to readers, then it will be convincing, entertaining, powerful. Unfortunately, WWB frequently falls to childish anger and insults. Taking subtle, derisive jabs at the antics of a president is funny, calling him a fuckhead is not. The latter only succeeds in making you look small and bitter. Because of where my sympathies lie, I would very much like to give WWB a good rating, but after reading through the site I feel annoyed rather than triumphant. Many of WWB’s posts read more like a ranting space for the author to succumb to name-calling rather than a sarcastic and clever attempt to show us what is wrong with Bush.

No one was ever convinced by being called a fucking loser. Of course, if the purpose of WWB is only to be a emotional trash can, then fine, it has served its purpose. However, if WWB wants to make people think about the situation the world is in, wants to convince people that George Bush is really a joke, then there should be an attitude adjustment. I suggest the author take deep breaths and put off posting in WWB immediately after watching the news or receiving hate mail. Take some time to organize thoughts and think up witty comebacks. This way, the entries will sound less like the rantings of a man in rage, spitting disorganized and self-righteous words in a jumble.

There are some funny stuff on the site, most of them made up of linked articles, a few penned by the author himself. If the author will lessen the needless name-calling and concentrate on presenting his arguments in a logical and sane way, then WWB can be a great anti war humor site. Mature adults (readers of WWB probably fall into this category) will be won over by sophisticated humor and good essays, like the one about the definition of patriotism. Whereas excessive usage of the word ‘fuck’ will bring giggles only from 3rd graders (who are not likely to read WWB).

The author says this: Personally however, I like to talk with a complete idiot so that I am reminded I am at least smarter than someone. You know what the characteristics of a complete idiot are? They include resorting to calling people ‘fuckheads’ when they can’t win arguments. WWB has issues. The author has some good points. It’s all just a matter of presentation – to come across as a mean, angry person, or a clever, angry person. So stop being daft and start the serious work of showing us why Bush is ridiculous. A lot of us are willing to be convinced here.

WorldWarBush

“a tear in the fabric of spacetime”, is what Rachel, the creator of the site calls “just the random musings of a girl”. I’m still a little unclear on where the title came from, as it literally refers to scientific theory and this weblog doesn’t really relate to anything of the nature.

The layout is one of Blogger’s generic templates, with the colors slightly altered to different shades of purple. The site still seems to be in the beginning stages, with Rachel still deciding if she wants to post on a regular basis or not. The archives date back to March 9, 2003. If you’re lucky, you’ll find two days in a row where the author has posted, but more often than not, you’ll see days go by without a post.

This site is only a weblog. There’s no way to contact the author, or leave a comment about a particular entry. You can’t learn more info about the author through other links or anything of the nature. Anything you learn about the author or her life has to be found in each entry that’s made.

The writing style and content is really all over the board at “a tear in the fabric of spacetime”. For instance, one paragraph in the weblog’s first few days of being reads like this: The things we know as facts are really just crude approximations of reality. The laws of physics we know apply to “ideal” conditions that can’t actually be reached. We can make them reflect reality as closely as we want by adding in more and more terms. When we get into more “fuzzy” areas, like how people behave, what we say is a fact will actually be extremely skewed by our perceptions.

On the the other hand, there were two weeks of posts about procrastination, including sites Rachel had found about procrastinating. And there are other posts talking about trying to match the same pitch as squeaky furniture or making the decision on what college to go to.

While this review may seem quite empty, it’s only because the weblog at “a tear in the fabric of spacetime” is the same way. It’s a very generically written site. I’m sure the weblog makes sense to the author and to those that actually know her, it leaves anyone else that would happen to stumble upon the weblog in a haze of knowing nothing. I couldn’t find one reason throughout the entire site that would make me want to come back again.

a tear in the fabric of spacetime

Now I don’t like to start on negatives, but on entering ReMo Stylz all I was faced with was dark font on a black background. Assuming a lighter background was loading, which would enable me to at least read the posts, I waited. But after a few minutes, several animated GIFs were twitching at me from the left hand column, the centre of the screen was a dark void and the posts to the right were still unreadable.

GIFs seem to be the main content of the site. There is very little else. The posts (which I could only read by dragging the cursor over them) only date back to April 11 and the last one was posted on April 23. I only counted six entries, four of which simply stated the progress of the site’s start-up.

The left hand column consists mostly of flashing links to pages about tv, movies, sports and music that the twin authors like. However these, as with the rest of the site, are unfinished and you’re faced with a lot of “coming soon” GIFs.

The enthusiasm that was obviously pumped into the site’s initial construction shows that ReMo Stylz could have gone somewhere. The site has a nice, family feel, being run by twins who say that they “sometimes think alike,” and with an opening post that wishes their cousin a happy birthday. Aside from that there really is nothing there yet to recommend the site. The flashing, twirling GIFS gave me a headache, and with so few posts it looks like this weblog’s been abandoned.ReMoStylz

This is a Christian blog and many of the entries are related to the author’s struggles as a Christian. These entries, which clearly depict Mark Jedrzejczyk’s difficulties in sustaining his faith, are something that Christian readers can relate to. The writings are very deep and the author is able to express himself beautifully. Mark also occasionally posts lyrics, poems and short stories on his blog (though the more recent ones have been transferred to the section under “Stories” or “Poems”).

The design of the blog is simple and functional. There are 2 boxes on the side; one containing the monthly archives and the other encloses a list of sites pertaining to this blog (including a list of recommended readings and awards won by the site, as well as the “Stories” and “Poem” sections).

The archives started from October 2002, and according to the ‘debut’ entry, this blog is older than that, but there was a discrepancy with the previous host of digitalbranch.net. Thus, there are much fewer entries on the ‘new’ site. The blog is updated a few times per month, so you may want to check it out on a monthly basis.

I found Mark’s writings very touching (particularly the entry titled “The Fire Immortal” and it is definitely one of the more “genuine” Christian blogs on the Internet. Personally, I think that non-Christian readers would not be interested in this blog because of the religious content. But you could always give it a try, and you might develop a liking for the author’s poems and short stories, if not for his blog itself.
Digitalbranch.net